While the mysterious disappearance on March 8, 2014, of Malaysian Airlines flight MH-370 with 239 souls on board flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, continues to haunt the airline, it suffered another debilitating blow when on July 17, 2014, flight MH-17, another Boeing 777 that was cruising along the international airway at 33,000 feet, fell out of the sky. The wreckage of this Malaysian Airlines flight that was en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, was found in a field in Eastern Ukraine, 80 kilometres short of the Russian border in the territory held by the pro-Russia Ukrainian rebels who have been battling forces of their government.

The immediate reaction from various quarters was that the airliner was shot down most probably by a surface-to-air missile. This however, is only a preliminary assessment and the actual cause of the disaster can only be ascertained through an impartial international investigation. Given the situation of conflict in the region, this will be a difficult proposition as access to the wreckage will not be easy.

In the meantime, all 298 innocents on board from nine different nations, perished in the crash. Absence of distress call from the MH-17 indicates that the destruction of the aircraft was sudden, possibly an in-flight explosion leading to disintegration.

Since February this year, a battle has been raging between the pro-Russia rebels in the Donetsk region of Eastern Ukraine and the forces of the Government of Ukraine. The rebels have established control of a sizeable area in Eastern Ukraine and have declared the formation of Donetsk People’s Republic. Even though, the area has become a battle zone with frequent aerial action, no restriction had been placed for international civil air traffic by the regulatory authorities.

What Could Have Gone Wrong

There are as many explanations for the disaster as the number of parties involved and the hypotheses offered by the parties concerned are mutually conflicting. The Ukrainian Government holds the Russian-backed separatists engaged in conflict in Eastern Ukraine responsible for the disaster. The separatists on the other hand, are blaming the Ukrainian Government. And of course, the Ukrainian Government along with their Western supporters would like to pin Russia down for the tragedy alleging complicity with the Ukrainian rebels. Apart from the tragic loss of lives, this sordid episode is only fuelling the tension between the US and Russia with the two superpowers hurling accusations at each other for the disaster and slapping sanctions.

The Russian Perspective

Russia believes that the probability that the MH-17 was shot down by the Ukrainian armed forces, is high especially as they have a track record of similar misdemeanour. In October 2001, Ukraine shot down a Russian civilian aircraft over the Black Sea during a military exercise. The Ministry of Defence (MoD) of the Russian Federation says it has evidence that when in the proximity of Donetsk, flight MH-17 deviated by 14 km towards the North from the air corridor. It then flew back into the air corridor and disappeared from the radar screen at 17:23 Moscow time. The reason for the deviation can be ascertained only after analysis of data obtained from the black box.

As per the Russian MoD, several units of the Buk-M1 missile system had been deployed in the vicinity of Donetsk by the Ukrainian armed forces. This weapon system is capable of engaging aerial targets up to a range of 35 km and altitudes up to 22 km. The Russian MoD is of the view that as the Ukranian rebels do not possess combat aircraft, the Buk-M1 air defence system was deployed by the Ukrainian armed forces in the vicinity of Donetsk obviously against a perceived threat from the Russian Air Force. Also, Russia claims it has not delivered any Buk-M1 missiles systems to the Ukrainian rebels.

As per the Russian MoD, both the impact point and the airway lie within the air defence zone of the Buk-M1 missile system deployed by the Ukrainian armed forces. This is suggestive of their role in the disaster. Their suspicion is strengthened by the fact that on July 17, Russian intelligence detected increased activity of Ukrainian radars of the Buk missile system. At that time there were three civilian aircraft transiting the area namely a flight from Copenhagen to Singapore at 1717 hours, flight from Paris to Taipei at 1724 hours and the ill-fated flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. All the three aircraft were being tracked by the air traffic control radars of the Russian MoD.

The Russian air traffic control also detected a Ukrainian Air Force aircraft, believed to be a Su-25, climbing towards flight MH-17 and was observed to be between three to five km from it. The Su-25 carries the R-60 air-to-air missile which can lock-on to a target at a distance of 12 kilometres and destroy it at a range of five km. The Russian MoD would like to know what the fully armed Su-25 was doing in an international airway at the altitude at which civil airliners were operating.

At 1720 hours, when flight MH-17 was 51 km from the Russian border on a bearing of 300 degrees, the Russian air traffic control radar observed that the Boeing 777 began to lose speed and by 17:21:35 hours, it was down to 200 kmph. The ill-fated airliner was last observed to be over the area where the wreckage was found later. There is thus a possibility that MH-17 was shot down by the Ukrainian Su-25.

Another theory advanced by Russia is that this was a deliberate attempt by Ukraine to shoot down the Russian presidential plane carrying Vladimir Putin returning from the BRICS Summit and put the blame on the Ukrainian rebels. Putin’s aircraft was to fly along the same international airway at about the same time as the MH-17. However, for some reason, it deliberately changed its route of which the Ukraine military was not aware. Hence it mistook MH-17 for the Russian presidential plane and brought it down as plannned.

Ukranian Response

Kiev claims that it has proof to show that the missile that brought down MH-17 was fired by the pro-Russia rebels who have been supplied with this weapon system by Russia. This was stated in a press conference by Andrey Lysenko, spokesman for Ukraine’s Security Council. This position was reiterated by Petro Poroshenko, President of Ukraine who said, “We have strong evidence of the cause of the MH-17 crash. We know exactly the place from where the surface-to-air missile was launched. the place where it hit the civilian plane and where it crashed. We are ready to provide evidence to the international investigation commission”. Ukraine has also claimed that it has compelling evidence that a Russian crew operated the missile system that brought down MH-17 and accused Moscow of helping rebels in destroying the evidence.

Role of Pro-Russia Rebels

The Ukraine government has released intercepts of a conversation claimed to be between the rebels and a Russian that suggests that the former mistook the ill-fated plane for a military transport aircraft. Igor Strelkov, self-proclaimed Defence Minister of the Donetsk People’s Republic, also one of the most brutal pro-Russia leaders in the insurgency and is a retired Colonel from Russian military intelligence, had tweeted that they had shot down the Malaysian aircraft MH-17 mistaking it for a Ukrainian Air Force plane. This was apparently a tragic blunder and not a deliberate attack on a passenger airliner. However, before July 17, the rebels had been targeting Ukrainian military aircraft with surface-to-air missiles and had downed over a dozen planes. The attack on the MH-17 was a continuation of the exercise; but tragically, they went horribly wrong, a fact that they realised only later.

The US State Department claims to have evidence that MH-17 was brought down by a Russian-made SA-11 surface-to-air missile fired by separatists close to the Russian border in Eastern Ukraine. The evidence is yet to be made public.

Preventive Action

The destruction of MH-17 by hostile action while operating in an international airway that had not been declared unsafe by the international regulatory authorities, brings into focus the harsh reality that airline safety can be easily undermined by factors over which airlines or the regulatory authorities may not have control at all. The downing of MH-17 is undoubtedly an outrageous act of terrorism. At any point in time, there is military conflict raging in different parts of the world involving two or more nations and/or non-state actors. With surface-to-air missiles becoming increasingly lethal with enhanced range, devastating accuracy, ready availability and easy portability, airliners operating in international airways cannot take for granted immunity to even unintended hostile action by some trigger-happy elements on the ground, as it appears to have happened in the case of MH-17. There is therefore an imperative need to review in its entirety, the vital issue of airline safety.

The immediate solution that comes to mind is the installation of sophisticated missile defence system on airliners. In fact, Israeli airliners are equipped with a device from Elbit Systems called Multi-Spectral Infrared Countermeasure that deflects an oncoming shoulder-fired heat-seeking missile. While this may be an effective solution at low levels against shoulder-fired missiles that have limited range, this system may not be effective against long-range radar-guided missiles.

Installation of sophisticated missile defence systems across entire fleets may be cost-prohibitive making air travel even more expensive and unaffordable by many. Also, such a system will impose new technological burdens on the airline industry. With galloping technology, missile defence systems may become obsolete in a few years requiring upgrade or replacement, an expensive proposition indeed. Also, a single missile defence system may not be able to counter the entire range of guidance systems employed on surface-to-air missiles or provide immunity to the platform from hostile action by combat aircraft armed with guns. Technological innovation to neutralise such threats may therefore not be a viable option.

What is urgently needed is a comprehensive review by the international regulatory authorities of the criteria of defining “Safe Air Corridors”. There is evidently a need to be far more discriminatory and to set more stringent standards in this regard. But perhaps the most expedient option at this point in time would be to avoid flying in international air corridors that lie over or in the vicinity of conflict zones. While this may to some extent impinge on the finances of the airlines, the passengers will at least have a safe ride.