Blake Hall
While Russian officials and the airline itself are denying claims by the Islamic State (ISIS) in Egypt that they shot down Kogalymavia Flight 9268 out of the sky over the Sinai Peninsula Saturday, killing all 224 people on board, an executive with the company cited “an external influence” as the reason for the crash and said that planes just don’t break apart in the middle of a flight for no reason.
While the term “external influence” is hazy and hardly specific, it leaves the door open for a missile or bomb of some kind as the cause, and it would certainly support the following grainy footage ISIS released which they say is the Kogalymavia aircraft suddenly exploding — at their hands.
The jihadists also released this statement along with it: “the soldiers of the caliphate succeeded in bringing down a Russian plane in Sinai”. They also were sure to say that it was in response to Russian strikes in Syria.
Egyptian government officials are also skeptical of the ISIS claims. Their prime minister, Sharif Ismail, called out the story as bunk completely.
“Experts have affirmed that technically planes at this altitude cannot be shot down, and the black box will be the one that will reveal the reasons for the crash,” he said.
Russian transport minister Maksim Sokolov backed up Ismail.
“This information cannot be considered accurate. We are in close contact with our Egyptian colleagues and aviation authorities in the country. At present, they have no information that would confirm such insinuations.”
Another airline official, Alexander Smirnov, said that the crew didn’t issue any warnings or communications during the final moments. He also confirmed that the plane’s flight and voice data recorders have been recovered but not yet read or decoded.