Multiple landing attempts denied
2010-04-15 21:09
Moscow - A Russian official on Thursday denied reports that Polish president Lech Kaczynski's plane had made multiple landing attempts before it crashed last weekend.
"The information in the media that the Polish plane made three or four landing attempts does not correspond to reality," aviation official Tatyana Anodina was quoted as saying by Russian news agencies.
"I can say there was only one attempt to land," said Anodina, an official with the Interstate Aviation Committee, which regulates civil aviation in Russia and other former Soviet republics.
Early media reports cited witnesses as saying that Kaczynski's Russian-built Tu-154 attempted to land several times amid thick fog, before clipping treetops en route to the runway and breaking up in a fiery crash.
All 96 people aboard the plane were killed in the disaster outside the city of Smolensk in western Russia.