At 3:26 am on September 1, 1983, passengers on Korean Air flight 007 had already fallen into a sweet dream. Suddenly, a loud bang came from the tail of the passenger plane, and the plane suddenly shook violently, and it dropped rapidly by 1,000 feet in more than ten seconds. The air pressure in the cabin dropped rapidly, and the oxygen hood fell automatically. Screams, cries, prayers filled the cabin, and despair was written on the face of every passenger.
3:38, the plane crashed on the high seas southwest of Sakhalin Island. All 269 passengers on board were killed, and none of them survived.
(Korean Airlines Flight 007 crashed, the picture shows what it means)
So, how could a civil aviation passenger plane carrying hundreds of people crash easily? What exactly has it encountered? What is the reason for the crash of
1 and 007?
This Korean Air Boeing 747 aircraft , with the number 007, took off from Kennedy Airport in New York, USA on August 31, 1983. Come on the way through the , Alaska , and the destination is , Gimpo International Airport , Seoul, South Korea.
Just the day after the crash of Flight 007, the Americans claimed that the flight accident was related to the Soviets. Because before the flight crashed, the United States intercepted a call from the Soviet military, "The borders have been invaded, and you are ordered to approach and destroy the target." The Soviet Air Force Su-15 fighter jets were accepted.
In other words, flight 007 was shot down by Soviet fighter jets.
As soon as these words were spoken, international public opinion was in an uproar, accusing the Soviet Union of atrocities, and actually attacking civilians without any defense, wantonly massacring unarmed civilians. The Soviet Union was instantly pushed into the forefront and under tremendous pressure.
The Soviets immediately stood up to clarify that the Soviet fighter jets did intercept and drive away Flight 007 and did not shoot down. However, in the face of the attack order issued by the Soviet military announced by the United States, the Soviets could not argue and had to admit that it was indeed the Su-15 fighter launching the air-to-air missile and shooting down Flight 007. But it claimed that this was the Soviets' self-defense, because Flight 007 deviated from the route seriously and invaded Soviet airspace, and was shot down by the Soviet army as an reconnaissance plane .
(Soviet Air Force Su-15 fighter jet)
2, why did flight 007 deviate from the route? Flights that fly normally in
have fixed routes, so why does flight 007 deviate from the route?
It was not until after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 that Russia handed over the black box for Flight 007. After an investigation by ICAO, it was found that the reason why the plane deviated from the route was caused by the captain's negligence. The route of the Boeing
Boeing passenger plane could have been pre-entered. After reaching high altitude, the turn is controlled by the computer to achieve independent flight. However, the head and deputy captain of Flight 007 forgot to switch HDG mode to INS inertial navigation mode, causing the passenger plane to seriously deviate from the route during flight.
according to the scheduled route of Flight 007, it should fly on a route 144 kilometers from Soviet airspace, but when the plane takes off, it flies north of the scheduled route. A few minutes after Anchorage refueling took off, the plane had deviated 11 kilometers from the channel, but the air traffic control did not issue an early warning. When the aircraft entered the radar surveillance range of the US Air Force located in Alaska, the US Air Force did not issue a warning because it had no jurisdiction.
, just like that, flight 007 deviated from the route all the way. When it flew to , Kamchatka Peninsula, , in the Soviet Union, it had deviated from the scheduled route for more than 500 kilometers.
(Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union)
3. Why are passenger planes that deviate from the route shot down?
Kamchatka Peninsula is a secret military stronghold of the Soviet Union. The Soviets deployed a large number of strategic weapons here, and even anchored strategic nuclear submarines carrying nuclear weapons. This is the Soviet military forbidden zone. According to the Soviets' usual style, any flying object that breaks into its military forbidden zone will be attacked.
Moreover, the Soviets claimed that during the Cold War, the United States often used reconnaissance aircraft to spy on Soviet military intelligence. Although this reconnaissance aircraft was smaller than that of the Boeing 747, it had an extremely similar appearance.Moreover, the Soviets also found that the flight trajectory of the passenger plane was very suspicious when approaching the Kamchatka Peninsula. It was not the straight line advance that the passenger planes often made, but the serpentine flight.
Therefore, the Soviets had sufficient reasons to determine that this was an American reconnaissance aircraft and they had to be shot down. The shooting down flights of
4 and 007 also have its special historical background.
Since the 1950s, the United States and the Soviet Union have begun decades of Cold War confrontation. The NATO organization led by the United States and the Warsaw Pact organization led by the Soviet Union have begun a comprehensive competition in military, politics, economy, diplomacy and other aspects. Driven by this Cold War mentality, it is no surprise that Flight 007 was shot down.
According to the Americans who participated in the post-rescue, Flight 007 did not explode or disintegrate in the air, and it eventually landed on the sea of Sakhalin Island.
However, not only did the search and rescue personnel found only a few plane wreckage at the scene, but only four bodies of the victims were found. Nearly 300 people were not seen alive or dead. Where did they go?
Perhaps, Korean Air Flight 007 is destined to be a mystery.
(Reference: "Korean Air Flight 007 Incident")
