Polish government plane was tossed about twice over the airport seconds before crash

Three myths, pillars of the Russian narration for the Polish government’s plane crash in Smolensk are being questioned by experts.

On the morning of the April 10th, 2010 news media around the world were repeating Russia’s “ explanation” of the causes of the catastrophe. CNN, NBC, BBC together with conservative Fox News informed viewers that: pilots three times attempted to land blindly in fog, TU-154 collided with the birch losing its wing and crashed killing passengers and crew. (The Washington Times reporter Bill Gertz correctly noticed that Russians were not carrying honest investigation and that the Warsaw government did not press Moscow for answers to questions about the crash.)

Days later Russians, claimed that the Polish high-ranking officials on board “had influence” on the pilot’s decision to land.

It appears that all this information can not be confirmed by the experts’ accident investigation.

Myth 1: The aircraft collided with the birch tree, lost its wing and turned upside down. 

Two independent experts proved unambiguously that the wing of the TU-154 plan was not broken after the collision with the birch tree. Dr Wieslaw Binienda’s team, led by NASA experts, analyzed TAWS data (Terrain Awareness and Warning System) using mathematical models. Binienda, who also investigated the Columbia shuttle crash, argued that the analysis of the plane’s weight, speed and the diameter of the birch shows that the machine could have lost only a small edge of the wing and this would not have influenced the stability of the plane. As he emphasized, the plane cannot have been flown and turned upside down (by 180 degrees) for such a long time (as Russian report claimed) after crashing into the birch.

Dr Binienda said that his experiment has shown that the plane, in fact, flew 20 metres above the birch. However, the tragedy started about 70 metres behind the tree when the aircraft was tossed about two times from still unknown reasons at the altitude of 29 metres.

Dr Binienda’s experiment conclusion.

Dr Binienda and his team consulted his research with another NASA specialist Kelly Carey.

Myth 2: Pilots attempted to land three times in thick fog

Today it is obvious that the TU-154 pilots did not intend to land. Contrary to the Russian lie, they were also making sovereign decisions. No one “put psychological pressure” on them.

Initial Russian reports had said that president’s Tupolev plane attempted to land three times – and that on its fourth attempt it clipped a copse of trees between 500 to 700 metres short of the runway, and immediately broke up. Today, however, they confirmed there had been only one – disastrous – attempt to land. (source)

In fact they did not. According to the transcript of the talks between the Smolensk traffic control tower and the TU-154 pilot, he said: “we are climbing to the second circle”.

Myth 3: Fog appeared over the Smolensk airport naturally. 

The Smolensk airport was covered by the fog. This fog in itself appears to be strange and is being investigated with the help of the American government.

Because Polish government’s plane TU-154 carried among other Polish highest ranking officials head of NATO state and its highest Army’s commanders. According to reports, many were carrying electronic devices with sensitive NATO data. Russians acquired ultra secret codes used by NATO militaries for secure satellite communication.

if the Russian electronic intelligence service, known as the Federal Agency of Government Communications and Information, was able to recover and use the communication key code from the wreckage, electronic spies will be able to decode months’ or perhaps years’ worth of scrambled communications that are routinely gathered electronically for just such an occasion.

The coded communications, if decrypted, would reveal some of NATO’s most intimate secrets, such as plans for defenses and even the identities of agents or allied eavesdropping sources.

That is why NATO states’ public opinion, not only its leadership, should be interested in the detailed explanation of this crash.