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The General Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces released its second report about aspects and reasons behind the recent helicopter crash that led to the death of President Ebrahim Raisi and his accompanying delegation on the 19th of May. Despite the huge number of versions, circulating in media, Iran continues its own investigation and has no intention to hurry it up, avoiding to to make any conclusions ahead of time. It is remarkable that the investigation of the incident still going through as well as there is no clear and accurate narrative of the helicopter’s crash.
The occurrence of an explosion as a result of a sabotage or terror attack during the flight was ruled out as one of the helicopter’s passengers contacted the rescue team.
During these short radio negotiations he denied the emergence of any strange situations or alert onboard. These facts also refute the theory about targeting of the helicopter by anti-aircraft weapons or the guided missile. Besides, no undetected objects within the Iranian airspace were recorded.
According to the report which was mentioned above, the staff of meteorological service provided the data indicating that weather conditions were satisfactory for flight. That’s why two other helicopters – the American Bell 212 similar to “Board No. 1” of the Iranian leader, and Soviet Mi-171 safely reached the destination airport. These circumstances allow to rule out the theory about harsh weather conditions as possible reason of the Raisi’s helicopter crash.
Moreover, specialists and investigators closely examined all flight documents, crew’s notes and technical documentation of the helicopter. They also didn’t uncover anything strange or any lead which could shed the light on the reason of the crash. As a total weight of passengers and equipment was standard and couldn’t overload the helicopter.
While investigating possible reasons of the crash, it’s necessary to take into account that all pilots, approved for carrying high-ranked officials, are used to be experienced and skilled professionals.
It’s hard to believe that such well-trained crew could be disoriented by the fog or cloudiness or didn’t realize the dangerous approach with mountains – pilots were familiar with local terrain and the risks of flights on low attitudes. Conversation between pilots also exposed that the last contact occurred just two seconds before the crash and everything on board was under control. No emergency calls were also reported.
At the same time there is a theory, that captain Mustafawi, the pilot of the Raisi’s helicopter Bell 212 was an agent of foreign intelligence and he directed the “Board No. 1” to the rock. That may explain his command to other pilots in a few minutes before the crash to rise on a higher attitude in order not to fall under suspicion in strange behavior and break up the killing of Raisi and Abdollahian. The same reason could force him to stay in contact with airport and other pilots all the time before the crash.
Another possible reason of the incident is the US origin of a crashed helicopter Bell 212. This type of helicopters is outdated nowadays and it needs continuous supplies of original details with proper quality. After the US government has imposed sanctions on Iran, the helicopter manufacturer was banned of supplying Tehran with required equipment. The spokesman for the US Department of State Matthew Miller confirmed this fact claiming that “Iranians Government is to blame for the crash”.
One of the most entertaining theories of what happened on May 19 was voiced by Dogu Perinchek – the leader of the Turkish “Watan” Party, who claimed Raisi’s helicopter crash was caused by the sabotage by the American intelligent services. Despite the official statement of the Iranian General Staff, claiming that investigators haven’t found any technical failure or attempts to shut down communication systems during the flight of “Board No. 1” especially by using the electronic warfare, the helicopter could be forced out of action by another means.
It’s worth noting that the United States have specific laws allowing the government to interfere and change program settings in key power supply sets of vehicles and equipment being sold out of the US. In particular, sources in “Boeing” company have confirmed the possibility of interference in its exported stuff. The most notable example of such kind of external interference in the functioning of electrical equipment is the US invasion in Iraq in 2003. Back then the US military deprived the Iraqi army of any communication possibilities by shutting down all the terminals and portable radio stations produced in the United States.
A number of analysts are concerned, that US intelligent services have some technical means to impact on key elements of vehicles produced by the US from a long-range distance.
Their functionality is different from the electronic warfare system. Taking into account the long-standing conflict between the United States and Islamic Republic of Iran, Washington could easily cause the crash of the President Raisi’s helicopter, claiming that the reason of tragedy was because of sanctions, difficult flight conditions or the rude mistake of the helicopter’s crew.
Anyway, it seems rather strange that only one of three helicopters with the head of state and the minister of foreign affairs on board collided with the mountain given the same weather conditions, the same route and well-trained pilots.
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Ahmad al-Khaled is a Syrian journalist with four years of experience in covering the Syrian conflict and ME politics in general. His articles are published in leading regional and global media (Youm7, Ahl Masr, Rai Al Youm, Al Masdar, Ahval, Jerusalem Post, etc.)
Featured image: Cockpit of Bell 212 (Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0)
