2004 Russian aircraft bombings

Volga-AviaExpress Flight 1303

Occurrence
Date	August 24, 2004 (2004-08-24)
Summary	Terrorist bombing
Site	Tula Oblast, Russia
Aircraft type	Tupolev TU-134A-3
Operator	Volga-AviaExpress
Registration	RA-65080
Passengers	34
Crew	9
Fatalities	43
Survivors	0

Siberia Airlines Flight 1047

Occurrence
Date	August 24, 2004 (2004-08-24)
Summary	Terrorist bombing
Site	Rostov Oblast, Russia
Aircraft type	Tupolev TU-154B2
Operator	Siberia Airlines
Registration	RA-85556
Passengers	38
Crew	8
Fatalities	46
Survivors	0

The Russian aircraft bombings of August 2004 were terrorist attacks on two domestic Russian passenger aircraft at around 23:00 on August 24, 2004. Both planes had flown out of Domodedovo International Airport in Moscow.

Note: All times quoted below are local times, UTC +4. All events occurred in the same time zone.

Flights

Volga-AviaExpress Flight 1303

The first to crash was Volga-AviaExpress Flight 1303, a Tu-134 aircraft, registered RA-65080, which had been in service since 1977. The plane was flying from Moscow to Volgograd. It left Domodedovo International Airport at 22:30. Communication with the plane was lost at 22:56 while it was flying over Tula Oblast, 180 km south-east of Moscow. The remains of the aircraft were found on the ground several hours later. Witnesses on the ground said that they saw a strong explosion on the plane before it crashed.

34 passengers and 9 crew members were on board the plane. All of them died in the crash.

Siberia Airlines Flight 1047

Just minutes after the first crash, Siberia Airlines Flight 1047, which had left Domodedovo International Airport at 21:35, disappeared from the radar screens and crashed. The Tu-154 aircraft, registered RA-85556, which had been in service since 1982, was flying from Moscow to Sochi. According to an unnamed government source of the Russian news agency Interfax, the plane had broadcast a hijack warning while flying over Rostov Oblast at 22:59.

The plane disappeared from radar screens shortly after that and crashed. 38 passengers and 8 crew members were on board the plane, and there were no survivors after the crash. The debris of the aircraft was found on the morning of August 25, 2004 9 km from village Glubokoye, Rostov Oblast in Kamensk-Shakhtinsky Raion.

Responsibility

The two almost simultaneous crashes caused speculations about terrorism. President Vladimir Putin immediately ordered the Federal Security Service (FSB) to investigate the crashes. By August 28, the FSB had found traces of the explosive RDX in the remains of both planes. Itar-Tass news agency reported on August 30, 2004, "without a shadow of a doubt", the FSB security service said that "both airplanes were blown up as a result of a terrorist attack".

A little known group called the Islambouli Brigades claimed responsibility; the truth of those claims remains uncertain. The Islambouli Brigades have also claimed that five of their members were on each plane; experts are skeptical about the possibility of (and the need for) so many terrorists on board.

The subsequent investigation found that the bombs were triggered by two female Chechen suicide bombers, Grozny residents Satsita Dzhebirkhanova (Siberia Airlines Flight 1047) and Amanta Nagayeva (Volga-AviaExpress Flight 1303). Nagayeva's brother had disappeared three years earlier and the family believed he was abducted by Russian forces.

Chechen field commander Shamil Basayev took responsibility for the bombings in an open letter published on the Chechen separatists' websites on September 17, 2004. He claimed that the aircraft bombings cost him €3,300 (US$4,000) in total. He has also denied the Islambouli Brigade's claims.

The bombings followed the Moscow metro bombing which left 41 people dead in February 2004 and preceded other deadly attacks in Russia soon afterwards: on August 31, 2004 a bomb killed 10 at a Moscow subway station, and then the Beslan hostage crisis began on September 1, 2004 which would leave over 335 people dead, many of them children.

Trials

On the day of the bombings the bombers were stopped in the airport by the police captain Mikhail Artamonov to be searched for weapons and for identification. They were accompanied by two male Chechens, the four of them arrived to Moscow on a flight from Makhachkala. According to the prosecution, Artamonov let them go without doing the search, and has been charged with criminal negligence. The prosecution asked the judge to give him 6 years of imprisonment, and on June 30, 2005 he was convicted of negligence and sentenced to 7 years of imprisonment. That sentence has been appealed, and the court reduced the term of his imprisonment from 7 to 6 years.

According to investigators, ticket seller Armen Aratyunyan was bribed approximately €140 (US$170) to sell tickets to the two women without getting proper IDs. Aratyunyan also helped Dzhebirkhanova to bribe the ticket-checking clerk, Nikolai Korenkov, with €25 (US$30), to get on board without a proper ID. On April 15, 2005, Aratyunyan and Korenkov were convicted of giving and taking the bribe respectively. Because of serious consequences of the bribe, they were sentenced to 1.5 years in settlement colony each (settlement colony convicts have more rights and privileges than people in regular colony).

Twenty-one relatives of the deceased passengers have filed a civil suit against the security company responsible for checking the passengers, ZAO East-Line Aviation Security. They demand 3,000,000 rubles (approximately €86,600 or US$115,000) in damages per victim. The trial in that case started in Volgograd on February 22, 2007. The security company is claiming that it is not liable for damages, but the persons who organized the bombings are. The court handling the civil case has sent a request to the prosecutor's office to get an update on the criminal investigation. It turned out that the investigation was suspended indefinitely on September 26, 2006. According to the investigator who was handling the case, the people helping the suicide bombers at the airport have been killed in Chechnya, the people responsible for planning the bombings have never been identified (Shamil Basayev, who claimed responsibility for organizing the bombings, has been killed as well), so the investigation was suspended due to lack of suspects. That civil case is still in court as of December 2009. Other passengers' relatives have also sued the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs, S7 Airlines and two insurance companies, Ingosstrakh and OAO Afes for damages (none of the defendants acknowledge any liability). On October 21, 2007, court in the latter case has found S7 Airlines liable for damages and ruled they should pay the relative of the victim in question 250,000 rubles (approximately €7,000), which was about 10% of what the plaintiffs asked for. S7's initial appeal was rejected by the court on May 27, 2008. A new S7 appeal was successful in April 2009 and the verdict was thrown out. This time, relatives of the passenger appealed that decision, but their appeal was dismissed in August 2009. They plan to appeal to a higher court.

External links

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External images
Photos of the crashed Tu-134
Photos of the crashed Tu-154

• S7 Airlines Statement about the bombing
• Template:Ru icon Report. Interstate Aviation Committee.
• Template:Ru icon Выводы Государственной комиссии по установлению причин катастроф воздушных судов ТУ-154 и ТУ-134, произошедших 24.08.2004 - Ministry of Transport
• Investigators probe Russia crashes - CNN
• Traces of explosives found - CNN
• 'Terrorist' Bombs Brought Down Russian Planes - Reuters (August 30, 2004)