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Thursday, July 17, 2014
Malaysia Airlines Flight 17: Official says plane shot down over Ukraine
Malaysia Airlines Flight 17: Official says plane shot down over Ukraine
KIEV, Ukraine -- A Ukrainian official said a
passenger plane carrying 295 people was shot down Thursday over a town
in the east of the country, and Malaysian Airlines tweeted that it lost contact with one of its flights over Ukrainian airspace.
Anton
Gerashenko, an adviser to Ukraine's interior minister, said on his
Facebook page the plane was flying at an altitude of 33,000 feet. He
also said it was hit by a missile fired from a Buk launcher, which can
fire missiles up to an altitude of 72,000 feet.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said his country's armed forces didn't shoot at any airborne targets.
"We
do not exclude that this plane was shot down, and we stress that the
Armed Forces of Ukraine did not take action against any airborne
targets," he said. "We are sure that those who are guilty in this
tragedy will be held responsible."
However, Ukraine pro-Russia rebels said they didn't shoot down airliner and blamed Ukrainian armed forces.
CBS News has not confirmed that the plane was shot down.
Malaysia
Airlines said on its Twitter feed that it "has lost contact of MH17
from Amsterdam. The last known position was over Ukrainian airspace.
More details to follow." The plane's destination was Kuala Lumpur.
The FAA has prohibited U.S. carriers from flying in that area of Ukraine, CBS News correspondent Bob Orr reported.
President
Barack Obama is asking his advisers to keep him updated on reports of
the plane. But the White House says it can't confirm reports that the
plane was shot down.
It was the second time that a Malaysia Airlines plane had gone missing in less than six months. Malaysia Airlines Flight 370
- another Boeing 777 - disappeared in March while en route from Kuala
Lumpur to Beijing. It has not been found, but the search has been
concentrated in the Indian Ocean far west of Australia.
The
Donetsk region government said Thursday's plane crashed near a village
called Grabovo, which it said is currently under the control of armed
pro-Russian separatists. The region where the flight was lost has seen severe fighting between Ukrainian forces and pro-Russia separatist rebels in recent days. A
launcher similar to the Buk missile system was seen by Associated Press
journalists near the eastern Ukrainian town of Snizhne earlier
Thursday.
On Wednesday evening, a Ukrainian fighter jet was shot
down by an air-to-air missile from a Russian plane, Ukrainian
authorities said Thursday, adding to what Kiev says is mounting evidence
that Moscow is directly supporting the separatist insurgents in eastern
Ukraine. Security Council spokesman Andrei Lysenko said the pilot of
the Sukhoi-25 jet hit by the air-to-air missile was forced to bail after
his jet was shot down.
Pro-Russia rebels, meanwhile, claimed
responsibility for strikes Wednesday on two Ukrainian Sukhoi-25 jets.
The Ukrainian Defense Ministry said the second jet was hit by a portable
surface-to-air missile, but added the pilot was unscathed and managed
to land his plane safely
Moscow denies Western charges that is
supporting the separatists or sowing unrest in its neighbor. The Russian
Defense Ministry couldn't be reached for comment Thursday about the
Ukrainian jet and Russia's foreign ministry didn't respond to multiple
requests for comment.
On Monday, Ukrainian officials said one of their military transport planes was hit by a rocket and downed in the same area.
Rebels
in conflict-wracked eastern Ukraine immediately claimed responsibility
for downing the Antonov AN-26, but Ukrainian Defense Minister Valeriy
Heletey said the rocket might have been fired from inside Russia.
Heletey
said the plane was flying at an altitude of 21,300 feet, which he said
was too high to be reached with the weapons used by the separatists
fighting government troops.
According to the Interfax reports,
MH17 was hit at close to normal cruising altitude for a passenger jet,
around 30,000 feet. No shoulder-fired missile is capable of effectively
targeting an aircraft at that altitude, lending credence to the reports
that it might have been a military air defense type missile like the
self-guided Buk system cited by the Russian news agency.
An undated photo shows two "Buk" mobile surface-to-air missile systems during a military parade in Kiev, Ukraine.
At least two Russian news outlets reported at the end of June that
pro-Russian rebels had seized a Ukrainian airbase in the Donestk
region where Buk missile systems were located. It wasn't clear how long
the rebels maintained control of the "A-1402 military base," or
whether any Buk systems had been removed from it.
The NTSB, FAA
and Boeing are all aware of the reports of the crashed Malaysian
Airlines plane - they're still in the process of gathering information
and don't have anything more to add at this time.
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