Iran crash: Plane was on fire and attempting to turn back to airport when it came down, investigators’ report says

Initial report claims jetliner crew never made radio call for help before disaster

The Ukrainian plane that crashed in Iran, killing all 176 people on board, was on fire and attempting to turn back to the airport when it came down, according to a report by Iranian investigators.

The report by Iran’s Civil Aviation Organisation (CAO) has said the crew of the jetliner never made a radio call for help and suggested a sudden emergency struck the Boeing 737 when it crashed just moments after taking off from Imam Khomeini International Airport in Tehran.

However, no immediate explanation has been given by investigators for the disaster.

Although the report confirmed both of the so-called “black boxes” which contain data and cockpit communications from the plane had been recovered, investigators said they were damaged and some parts of their memory had been lost.

Eyewitnesses have described seeing the plane engulfed in flames before crashing, according to the report.

Investigators have also initially ruled out laser or electromagnetic interference as a cause for the crash.

The findings follow suggestions by some aviation experts that the crash may have been a “shootdown event”, similar to the MH17 crash in 2014.

The OPS group, an aviation risk-monitoring group, has recommended taking “the starting assumption to be that this was a shootdown event” until evidence to the contrary emerges.

Iran has said it will not work with the US in its investigation of the crash.

“We will not give the black box to the manufacturer and the Americans,” Ali Abedzadeh, head of the CAO, told Iran’s Mehr news agency.

“This accident will be investigated by Iran's aviation organisation but the Ukrainians can also be present.”

The US National Transportation Safety Board would usually have a role in international investigations involving US-made Boeings, but Iran has the right to lead the investigation under global aviation rules.

Boeing has extended condolences to the victims' families and said it stands ready to assist.

All of the plane’s 167 passengers and nine crew members were killed in the crash, which caused a massive explosion as the aircraft hit the ground, likely due to it being fully loaded with fuel for the flight to Kyiv, Ukraine.

The victims of the disaster came from several countries, including 82 from Iran, at least 63 from Canada and 11 from Ukraine, according to officials.

Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, has said crash investigators from his country have arrived in Iran to assist the probe.

Mr Zelensky also said he plans to call Iran’s president Hassan Rouhani to discuss the crash and investigation.

“Undoubtedly, the priority for Ukraine is to identify the causes of the plane crash,” he said.

“We will surely find out the truth.”

Although Ukrainian officials initially agreed with suspicions that the three-year-old plane was brought down by mechanical problems, they later backed away from that view and declined to offer a cause while the investigation is ongoing.

The disaster occurred immediately after Iran launched a ballistic missile attack against Iraqi military bases housing US troops in retaliation for the killing of military general Qassem Soleimani last week.

Many of the victims are thought to be international students attending universities in Canada who were making their way back to Toronto via Kyiv after visiting family.

Justin Trudeau, Canada’s prime minister, has said 138 passengers on the flight were bound for his country and vowed to get to the bottom of what happened.

The crash has ranked among the worst losses of life for Canadians in an aviation disaster.

Additional reporting by Reuters