Azerbaijan Airlines announced on Friday that preliminary results of the investigation showed that the aircraft of flight J2-8243 that crashed in Kazakhstan received “external physical and technical intervention”. Azerbaijan Airlines suspended several flights to Russian cities on Friday.

Meanwhile, a passenger on the plane that crashed in Kazakhstan told Reuters that he had been heard at least one loud bang as it approached its original destination of Grozny in southern Russia.

“I thought the plane was going to break up,” Sabhonkul Rakimov, one of the passengers, told Reuters from the hospital, adding that he had started praying and preparing for the end after hearing the bang.

After the loud bang, the plane behaved strangely as if it was “drunk,” Rakimov said.

Flight J2-8243 crashed on Wednesday near the Kazakh city of Aktau as the flight diverted from an area of ​​southern Russia where Moscow has repeatedly used air defense systems against Ukrainian drones. At least 38 people were killed while 29 people survived.

Four sources familiar with the preliminary findings of Azerbaijan’s investigation into the crash told Reuters on Thursday that Russian air defenses downed the plane by mistake.

The Embraer passenger jet had flown from Azerbaijan’s capital Baku to Grozny, south of Chechnya in Russia, before being diverted for hundreds of miles in the Caspian Sea. The first explanation was damage to the engines due to a flock of birds.

Asked about reports, also from the US, that Russian air defenses accidentally shot down the plane, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he had nothing to add, and did not want to make any assessment until the official investigation was completed.

Rosaviatsia, Russia’s civil aviation agency, said the plane’s pilot had been offered other airports where he could land, but chose Aktau, Kazakhstan. It added that it would provide “full support” to Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan’s investigations into the crash.

The airlines that announced they were canceling flights to Russia after the passenger plane was shot down:

  • Kazakhstan’s Qazaq Air suspends flights to Yekaterinburg.
  • Azerbaijan Airlines suspends flights to 7 Russian cities for security reasons.
  • Israeli airline El Al cancels all flights from Tel Aviv to Moscow.