New Delhi: The ill-fated MH-17 flight crashed over Ukraine on Thursday with 298 people on board including crew members. It is learnt that the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi could have been at the same place just an hour later as his flight was supposed to follow the same corridor.
However, it has also been clarified by the government that that there had been no danger to life of the PM. It said that there was no threat to Modi’s aircraft Air Force One. It flew the PM back from Germany over the same airspace where Malaysian flight crashed.
“I think that is speculation. There was no danger to our PM’s aircraft. No problem. On Air Force One, the flight data is on foreign radar,” said Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju.
He added that: “What happens is that whenever any air route (for a VIP aircraft) is finalised, the countries involved get to know about it. If you don’t keep them informed, there is another type of problem. So generally whenever any civilian aircraft flies over a country, suppose India, obviously the Government of India will know what aircraft it is, to whom it belongs, what its intentions are.”
According to a report published in The Hindu, PM Modi’s flight Air India-001 had taken off from Frankfurt at 11:22 GMT, which is two hours before the crash. It had been in the same flight corridor and these conditions were bound to put the flight of PM over the Ukraine Flight Information Region (FIR) about an hour later.
An aviation official said that pilot would have got to “decide whether to divert over Russia or the Black sea instead,” and the area through which the flight was supposed to pass would have been same as MH-17.
“There was no danger to the PM’s plane, but obviously the area that they would have flown over would have been the same. The pilot would have to decide whether to divert over Russia or the Black sea instead, “said the official.
The flight MH-17, which got crashed midway, had come down at Torez, near Shakhtersk. This place is around 40 km from the Russia border in Ukraine.
It has not been confirmed yet that the flight had any Indian passenger or not as the officials said that they have no information about it.
