MOSCOW, September 3. /TASS/. Russian and Polish investigators have started an additional examination of parts of the Polish presidential plane, which crashed near the city of Smolensk in 2010, Russian Investigative Committee Spokesperson Svetlana Petrenko told reporters.
"Today as part of another request by the Polish colleagues on legal assistance the IC’s representatives jointly with the personnel of competent Polish authorities started an additional examination of parts of the plane, which crashed eight years ago," Petrenko said.
The spokesperson noted that the investigators use modern equipment for making a "spherical panorama of objects." The investigators cooperate at a "high professional level."
The key effort as part of a criminal case has been carried out and there are more than 700 volumes of the case files. More than 500 eyewitnesses have been questioned and over 17,000 pieces of evidence have been examined, including various parts of the plane, objects and documents in the Polish and Russian languages. Some 1,500 forensic tests have been carried.
A Tu-154M airliner carrying a top Polish delegation crashed near the city of Smolensk in west Russia on April 10, 2010, killing all 96 people on board, including Polish President Lech Kaszynski and many other senior military and political figures.
The Russian investigators have no doubt that the crew’s failure to timely conduct a go-around maneuver caused the tragedy, Petrenko said. The crew continued landing despite poor visibility and did not react to the warning about approaching the earth, she said.
The investigation found out that the plane’s first collision with the top of a tree occurred at the height of around 11 meters and then the left half wing collided with a birch, and this led to the separation of a large part of the wing’s left panel. "This destruction caused the plane to spin and fall on the ground just several seconds in an inverted position," Petrenko said.
The investigators also thoroughly considered the theory about an explosion onboard the plane, she stressed. "However, numerous tests conducted by both Russian and Polish experts showed that there were neither traces of explosives on the bodies of the victims nor on the parts of the plane.".