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Russian crashes not due to aged planes, experts say
July 29, 2002
By Samantha Shields
MOSCOW (Reuters) - A recent spate of crashes and close scrapes by Russian planes is mere coincidence and not due to old age of the aircraft, Moscow-based experts said Monday.
Two weekend disasters killed nearly 100 people -- though the cause of neither has yet been established.
A Pulkovo Airlines Ilyushin-86 crashed into woods Sunday near Moscow's main airport, killing at least 14 people, a day after a Russian-built fighter jet plowed through a crowd of spectators at an air show in western Ukraine, killing 83.
Less than a month ago, a Tupolev Tu-154 jetliner collided with a Boeing 757 cargo plane over the Swiss-German border, killing 71 people.
"Has Russian aviation fallen under an evil spell? Is it not safe to fly in a Russian plane any more?" asked the Nezavisimaya Gazeta newspaper in a front-page article.
"One of the most widespread theories is that our Soviet planes and helicopters are hopelessly old."
But a top official at Russia's Civil Aviation Service said the public perception of poor safety belied good maintenance of the tough aircraft, designed in Soviet times, which serve as workhorses of Russia's passenger fleet.
"Planes crash, have crashed and unfortunately will continue to crash for unpredictable reasons," said Sergei Masterov, head of the service's safety department.
"These things happen for reasons of human or technical error, but our planes are not nearing the end of their lifespan."
The ill-fated Ilyushin had been in service since 1983 -- not exceptionally long for a commercial airliner -- while the Sukhoi fighter jet was some 15 years old and the Tupolev had only been in use since the mid 1990s.
Paul Duffy, a former pilot who is now an aviation consultant and Russian editor of Air Transport World, also dismissed suggestions that Russian aircraft were aging or decrepit.
He said safety levels were satisfactory, with airlines operating under tighter maintenance controls than Western counterparts.
"I don't see any connection between the accidents. Tupolevs and Ilyushins are built much tougher than Boeings and they're designed to land on runways that are nowhere near as good quality as those in the West," he said.
SERIES OF INCIDENTS
Swiss air traffic control has admitted it made a series of errors contributing to the Tupolev crash on July 1.
Also in July, a smaller Tu-134 aircraft crash-landed in Irkutsk in Siberia after its landing gear broke and two jets, a Yak-42 and another Tu-154, turned back to their starting airport after problems with an engine and landing gear.
Sunday's Il-86 crash was the first in the plane's 22-year service record. Experts began Monday to analyze its flight records.
Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma has fired top military officials following Saturday's air show disaster. Prosecutors said Monday that criminal negligence by the military top brass and the pilots had caused the plane to crash.
Boeing (BA.N) 727s, 737s and 747s were built to last for 60,000 flying hours while Russian models were designed to fly for half that time.
"But that doesn't mean they can't go up to 60,000 if you put the extra work into them," Duffy said.
Russia is not alone in allowing planes to continue to operate well past their original design lifespan. Until last year, there were 300-400 Boeings flying Western skies with over 100,000 hours on their clocks, Duffy noted.
"The only reason they're going out of service now is because of the lower needs of airlines in America after September 11," he said.
(Additional reporting by Robert Eksuzyan)
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