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Polish Air Force chief was in president Kaczynski's plane cockpit before crash — experts

The transcript of the recording made on board indicates that during the last three minutes the plane was in flight unauthorized persons kept entering and leaving the cockpit
Black boxes from Tupolev-154M AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko
Black boxes from Tupolev-154M
© AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko

WARSAW, April 7. /TASS/. Polish experts have confirmed that Polish Air Force commander, General Andrzej Blasik, was putting pressures on the crew of the ill-fortunate presidential Tupolev-154M liner up to the very moment of the plane’s crash near Smolensk in April 2010, as follows from a report quoted by the RMF FM radio station.

Polish specialists have interpreted the recordings, copied during their visit to Moscow in February 2014, with the use of different equipment. So far all transcripts were based on data retrieved from a MARS recorder.

According to the radio, this time the specialists managed to identify a 30% more words pronounced in the plane’s cockpit.

The newly discovered data confirmed that General Blasik was in the pilot’s cabin up to the moment of the plane’s crash and said this: "This is a fact, we must make it, to the end." Later, at an altitude of 300 meters above the surface, he said: "You’ll fit in. Be bolder."

The transcript also indicates that during the last three minutes the plane was in flight unauthorized persons kept entering and leaving the cockpit. The chief of protocol, Mariusz Kazana, is heard saying the plane must land. Somebody was constantly calling for quiet and calm. Also, the microphones on board caught dialogues in which passengers mentioned beer served on board.

Poland’s presidential Tupolev-154M liner crashed on April 10, 2010 while trying to land near Smolensk, killing all 96 people on board, including President Lech Kaczynski.

Interstate Aviation Committee specialists arrived at the conclusion the disaster was due to a human error, specifically, the crew's decision to land in bad weather under psychological pressures. A Polish government panel of inquiry said the causes of the crash were the plane’s descent to an impermissibly low altitude at an excessive speed in weather conditions ruling out visual contact with the surface and a belated decision to make another landing attempt.