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Rostov-on-Don airport may be opened morning March 21

The deputy governor said about 300 square meters of the runway should be repaired

ROSTOV-ON-DON, March 20. /TASS/. The airport in Rostov-on-Don may be opened before 9 in the morning on Monday, the region’s deputy governor Alexander Grebenschikov told reporters on Sunday.

"We plan to open the airport before 9 in the morning tomorrow," he said.

The deputy governor said about 300 square meters of the runway should be repaired.

Earlier on Sunday, Minister of Transport Maxim Sokolov said the main work at the crash site now is carried out by experts of the Investigative Committee and of the Interstate Aviation Committee, who "should approve beginning of repairing work."

"Today, during the daylight all necessary elements of the plane will be collected for a thorough analysis and for clearing out reasons of the accident," he said. "At about 6p.m. will begin works on the runway and also to restore the equipment, so that the airport could begin working on Monday morning."

The minister said the damage to the runway was not dramatic and the repairing will take about ten hours.

At the same time, technical flights have begun already - two planes without passengers on board have left Rostov-on-Don, and four more planes may depart, too.

On March 19, at 3:42 a.m. Moscow time (0:42 a.m. UTC), FlyDubai’s Boeing 737-800 crashed at Rostov-on-Don’s airport during a second attempt to land in complicated weather conditions (strong side wind and rain). The plane served regular Flight FZ 981 from Dubai. The passenger jet with capacity for 189 passengers had 62 people aboard, including the crew. None has survived.

The investigation looks into several leads: a pilot error, a technical malfunction, bad weather conditions, and others.