Since the accident of the helicopter in which the Iranian president, Ebrahim Raisí, his Foreign Minister, Hossein Amir Abdollahian, and other officials were traveling – all have died – became known, the authorities of the Islamic Republic have raised different possible causes: He has spoken of an emergency landing, bad weather and even maintenance problems with the device due to international sanctions against the regime. Experts believe that it is too early to know the reasons, since investigations into plane accidents are very complex, last months and take into account many factors.
Tehran and the Iranian media have referred to the helicopter collision as an “accident,” ruling out for the moment the possibility of sabotage or assassination. In fact, Israeli sources told Reuters that their country had nothing to do with the incident. At first, during the early hours of the morning, the Iranian authorities spoke of a “hard landing,” which was interpreted as the aircraft having to make a “forced landing.” However, the BBC Persian station emphasizes that this term is usually used by some governments, for example Russia, to refer to any aviation accident, not necessarily those that occur due to a forced landing due to circumstances.
The accident occurred on Sunday afternoon, when three helicopters carrying various Iranian Government officials were returning from the border with Azerbaijan, where Raisí had participated in the inauguration of a dam on the Aras River, which divides both States. After the event with the Azerbaijani president, Ilham Aliyev, Raisí left by helicopter for Tabriz, more than 100 kilometers away and where he was going to participate in another inauguration, but his aircraft crashed.
The damaged device was a Bell 212, a twin-engine transport helicopter developed in the 1960s and 1970s and still used in numerous countries, including Spain. It is American-made and, therefore, was received by Iran in the era before the Islamic Revolution (1979), after which the Middle Eastern country was subjected to the American blockade and international sanctions that make the entry of spare parts and supplies difficult. . For this reason, former Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif directly accused the United States of being “one of the main culprits” for “embargoing the sale of aircraft and parts to Iran and preventing the people of Iran from enjoying good air services.”
“The Bell 212 has proven to be a very reliable machine,” says Carlos García Molaguero, spokesperson for the Official College of Commercial Aviation Pilots (COPAC), which has operated this model for years both in the Spanish army and in the private sector. The pilot points out, however, that the parts of each helicopter have a certain useful life and must be subjected to periodic inspections by authorized maintenance centers. Iran no longer has access to this maintenance circuit (which also happens with Russian aircraft after the entry into force of Western sanctions for its invasion of Ukraine). The Islamic Republic has tried to circumvent this embargo by acquiring parts from third countries and even manufacturing them on its own, but also by changing its fleet for Russian or Chinese models.
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The main hypothesis
However, the main hypothesis cited by the Iranian media is that difficult atmospheric conditions triggered the tragedy. Sadegh Ziayan, head of the crisis management department of the Iranian Meteorological Organization, explained to state radio that snow-water precipitation with very low temperatures would continue until Monday morning at this point in the Dizmar forest, located at about 2,500 m. meters of altitude.
“In the mountains, one of the biggest dangers is the formation of ice on the device. Especially in these very old helicopters that do not have anti-icing systems for the structure or the blades,” explains García Molaguero: “This can affect the air intake in the engines or block the probes that give us the indication of speed and altitude, that is, the basic instruments for flying in conditions of poor visibility.”
Unlike airplanes, helicopter pilots operate their devices using visual references. Only when visibility conditions are poor does the so-called “instrumental flight” begin, that is, guided by the helicopter’s electronic screens and indicators. If poor visibility conditions occur, it is called Inadvertent Entry into Instrument Flight Conditions (IIMC), one of the scenarios most feared by pilots.
This may occur because the helicopter is surrounded by clouds, enters an area of fog, or the local weather worsens unexpectedly without nearby stations or airfields that can warn the crew (which could be the case in the helicopter area). incident in Iran). Sector authorities in the United States and Europe have warned that these cases represent around 15% of aviation accidents, and of them, between 72% and 90%—according to different studies—end with fatalities.
“You have to be very trained to make these transitions, because you have to go from taking references from the outside to looking at the aircraft’s instruments very quickly,” explains helicopter pilot Aniol Jódar, creator of the specialized podcast The Sustainability Formula. : “In these circumstances you can become disoriented, because your senses deceive you, you don’t know where you are going. The time to react is less than a minute.” This is what happened during the accident that killed NBA star Kobe Bryant in 2021. In this scenario, it is necessary to stabilize the aircraft and gain sufficient height to avoid collisions.
According to analyst Kyle Bailey, interviewed by Al Jazeera, the fact that the helicopter in which Raisí was traveling did not send any distress call would indicate that the pilot barely had time to try to stabilize the aircraft, since communications are only made once. once the problem is solved.
Why did it fly in these conditions?
The question remains as to why it blew up in these weather conditions. “There are times when you know that you are not going to be able to fly, but in most cases it is not so obvious, there are usually nuances. One option is to fly and look for gaps in the clouds, that depends on training and how much you know the area,” says Jódar. “The advantage of the helicopter is that it is a very versatile device and always has the last resort of landing if the terrain offers minimal options,” he adds.
Nor can the pressures of flying be ruled out. “There are usually them on flights with VIP passengers,” says Jódar, recalling the plane accident in which Polish President Lech Kaczynski died in 2010: according to a Russian report, the president’s companions pressured for a forced landing, although the Polish version attributes the accident to errors by Russian controllers. “This type of pressure is the most complicated part of our job. A good pilot is a risk manager: he takes the information and with that, based on his experience, his training, the conditions, he decides what to do,” adds the pilot.
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