WARSAW: Investigators blamed pilot error yesterday for a crash that killed Poland’s president, as harrowing details emerged of how the crew knew they were doomed after hitting trees while trying to land in Russia.As Poland’s national unity fractured over plans to bury president Lech Kaczynski in a castle alongside kings and heroes, officials released the first results from analysis of the plane’s black box flight recorders.
“The crew was aware of the inevitability of the coming catastrophe, if only due to the plane shaking after the wings hit the trees — which were certainly happened,” Poland’s chief prosecutor Andrzej Seremet told commercial radio.
Colonel Zbigniew Rzepa, a Polish military prosecutor, said the pilots of the Russian-made jet were aware of the imminent crash as the last seconds of the voice recordings “were dramatic”, but did not elaborate.
But Russian investigators found no evidence that “any of the high-ranking passengers forced the pilots to land in Smolensk,” Russia’s Interfax news agency quoted a source close to the investigation as saying.
The Polish presidential Tupolev Tu-154 crashed in thick fog Saturday near the western Russian city while taking a delegation to a memorial service for a World War II massacre. All 96 people on board, many of them senior Polish military and political figures, were killed.
Officials said yesterday that a “special security procedure” was being implemented for the arrival of US President Barack Obama and other foreign leaders in Krakow, with around 80 planes set to land there Sunday morning. — AFP