The Azerbaijani plane crash in Kazakhstan has triggered a deluge of speculations, with many suspecting that a Russian surface-to-air missile could have struck the aircraft. However, the tragic incident has also revived the memories of an aircraft that was hit by a missile in 2003 and yet managed to land safely with no fatalities.
On the fateful day of Christmas 2024, the Azerbaijan Airlines flight J2-8243, carrying 62 passengers, was diverted from its intended destination — Grozny in Russia, to Aktau in Kazakhstan — due to the foggy conditions at the Grozny airport. However, the aircraft crashed just 3 kilometers short of Aktau, killing about 38 people on board. Disturbing footage published online shows the aircraft going down in a steep descent at high speed.
The absence of specific information about the crash has given rise to a spate of speculations and claims, with several people and military bloggers suspecting an erroneous Russian strike on the aircraft.
These claims are based on footage showing holes in the damaged fuselage attributed to bullets or shrapnel. In fact, there is widespread suspicion that the aircraft was engaged by Russian air defense units when it approached Grozny.
Meanwhile, Andrii Kovalenko, head of the Center for Countering Disinformation at the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, said in a statement: “This morning, the Embraer 190 aircraft of Azerbaijan Airlines, flying from Baku to Grozny, was shot down by a Russian air defense system.”
He added the aircraft was likely shot down as it entered Russian airspace when the country was preparing to combat a suspected drone strike.
This incident has revived the memories of a somewhat similar incident two decades ago when a plane was hit by a surface-to-air missile, but it managed to land safely.
A Cargo Plane That Survived An Attempted Shootdown
This story is about an Airbus A300B2-200F cargo aircraft that was owned by the Belgian division of European Air Transport at the time and operated as DHL Express, a logistics company that conducts offshore deliveries.
On November 22, 2003, the aircraft took off from Baghdad International Airport (BGW). Previously known as the Saddam International Airport (SDA), it was renamed in April 2003 after the US invasion of Iraq. The aircraft was bound for Bahrain International Airport (BAH), which was a hub for DHL International Aviation Middle East at the time.
The plane had a crew of three people on that fateful day: two Belgian pilots and a Scottish flight engineer. The captain of this flight had 3,300 flying hours, more than half of which were in the A300.
The first officer in the crew had 1,275 flying hours, and the flight engineer had an impressive experience of 13,400 flying hours. As they embarked on the plane, little did they know that the most difficult day of their lives awaited them.
However, they knew those were troubled times and all flights operating in the region were vulnerable to attack. As soon as the aircraft took off, the crew decided to ascend quickly to minimize the possibility of a surface-to-air missile reaching and hitting the aircraft.
As per publicly available information, a surface-to-air missile was fired at the aircraft by a squad of militants from the paramilitary pro-Hussein Fedayeen Saddam group. The A300 had reached an altitude of 8,000 feet when the Sovet-origin 9K34 Strela-3 missile hit the aircraft between the left wing and the engine.
A fire was triggered, and the impact caused the A300’s flight control system to lose hydraulic pressure completely. The Hydraulic system of an aircraft allows it to raise and lower the landing gear.
The landing gear is a large, complicated mechanism that uses a lot of power. This power comes from hydraulic systems, which enable rapid and effective raising and lowering of the landing gear.
So, due to the loss of hydraulics, it became difficult to control the aircraft, and its pitch started to swing from nose-up to nose-down very rapidly. The crew had essentially lost control of the rudder, elevators, and ailerons after the missile struck the aircraft.
Without access to the flight control system, the crew was forced to steer the A300 using its engines. The landing gear was deployed to slow the aircraft down because it had to land immediately. However, the crew took around ten minutes to adjust to their new method of flying the aircraft using just engine power.
Impressive as it was, the crew learned to manage turns, climbs, and descents on engine power in just ten minutes.
Due to the volatile atmosphere prevailing in the country, the best bet for the crew was to make it back to where they came from: the Baghdad International Airport.
The aircraft was also leaking fuel from its damaged left wing, so the approach had to be handled extremely carefully. The flight engineer had to keep a constant eye on the engine due to damage to the left wing and fuel loss; if the left side’s fuel flow was cut off, he would have to feed fuel from the right tank to keep the engine moving. Each jet engine’s precise power regulation was essential to survival.
This implied that a port engine power outage might have posed a risk. After all, the basic thrust-based method of directing the aircraft depended on the ability to regulate each of the two turbofans accurately. Fuel would have needed to be supplied from the right-side tank if the left engine’s fuel feed had been cut off.
The crew’s original objective was to land on the 4,000-meter-long runway 33R in Baghdad. But, in an unprecedented turn of events, the errant A300 started to lose direction as it descended near the airport, making the much shorter runway 33L, the ideal choice in this situation.
The initial attempt at landing by the A300 was unsuccessful. On the second attempt, 16 minutes later, the plane finally made a successful landing on runway 33L. The aircraft experienced turbulence and rocked slightly just before touchdown, necessitating a thrust correction. After controlling the roll, the A300 ultimately made an off-center landing and instantly activated its reverse thrusters.
It lost its ability to stay on the runway’s straight path and swerved into the nearby dunes. After several hundred meters, the stricken aircraft finally stopped. The incident was seen as nothing short of miraculous because the crew survived despite being hit by a missile. Moreover, this was the first time an airliner had been successfully landed without hydraulics and solely on the engine power.
All the crew members were honored with several prestigious awards for their bravery and the high level of skill and professionalism they demonstrated in crisis.
The big question remains: was Azerbaijan Airlines flight J2-8243, which crashed near Aktau after making several landing attempts, hit by a Russian-origin missile?
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