THE HAVE HIDDEN THE DISPATCHER
[02:45 pm] 05 May, 2006

The administration of the Adler airport has hidden the workers of the shift who worked in the airport the day when the Armenian plane A-320 crashed. The police and the National Security Service are afraid of the mob law.

According to the Russian Mass Media, the RF National Security Service has not abandoned hopes of finding the record boxes which will shed light on the accident.

The plane crashed six minutes before landing which performing a second circle.

TWO ARMENIAN PLANES A-320 BURNT TO THE GROUND
[04:52 pm] 05 May, 2006

A fire destroyed a hanger at Zaventem Airport on Thursday night, leading to massive flight delays at the Brussels international airport on Friday.

The fire broke out at about midnight on Thursday in hangar 40, a shedowned by Sabena Technics where airplanes undergo maintenance works. Phase three of the regional disaster plan was put into action and airport fire fighters were given assistance by the Zaventem, Brussels, Vilvoorde and Leuven fire brigades. The A201 access road to the airport was temporarily sealed off.

Four people were injured. A worker with Sabena Technics suffered serious burns injuries and was rushed to the military hospital of Neder-over-Heembeek. Three firefighters suffered minor injuries and were treated at the scene. The fire brigade eventually brought the blaze under control, but could not prevent the roof of the hanger caving in. Firefighters are now letting the debris burn itself out under control.

Four planes that were in the hanger have been damaged. Two of them, an aircraft from the Armenian airline Armavia and a C-130 transport plane, were destroyed.

Despite the fact the hangar is situated a good distance away from the passenger terminal and runways, delays were being reported to flights on Friday nonetheless.

All flights were initially cancelled due to initial fears that the smoke from the fire contained toxic chemicals. But it was confirmed shortly before 8am that the smoke was not dangerous and flights resumed. Media reports at about 10am on Friday said planes were now departing as per schedule.

By the way, the company «International Armenian Airlines» informed that according to their information, their plane A-320 has burnt completely too, although the Belgian side does not inform about it.

As for «Armavia», the plane of which according to information from Belgium has totally burnt, does not have information about the situation in Belgium. Head of the press service of the company Jasmen Vilyan claimed that the schedule has remained the same.

1. Complete his mission quickly.

2. Refuel in Sochi.

3. Get his tail back to Yerevan ASAP to meet company timetable.

The blame? It wouldn’t surprise me if some of the people writing condolences are doing so because of a guilt trip.

Armenia’s air communication with the rest of the world has been complicated for the past three months by mysterious shortages of fuel which aviators blame on its sole government-connected supplier.

The grave lack of aviation kerosene at Yerevan’s Zvartnots international airports is forcing domestic and foreign airlines to make refueling stopovers or carry additional fuel on their flights to the Armenian capital. The precise cause of the shortages is still now known.

“The airport itself doesn’t import fuel,” a Zvartnots spokesman, Gevorg Abrahamian, told RFE/RL over the weekend. “There is a supplier who is supposed to meet our needs. The fuel has been hard to come by or not available at all since August. Our demand is simply not being met.”

According to Abrahamian, each plane taking off from Zvartnots is now given one metric ton of fuel, instead of the required 13-14 tons. The airport has already run out of its fuel reserves, the official said.

Zvartnots’s exclusive kerosene supplier is the Mika Limited company that specializes in fuel imports and has a de facto monopoly on trade in aviation kerosene. Mika officials have declined to comment on the situation despite repeated inquiries from RFE/RL. One of them said they can not comment because the company’s owner and chief executive, Mikhail Baghdasarov, is “too busy.” A Russian citizen, Baghdasarov is believed to be close to Defense Minister Serzh Sarkisian.

The airlines flying to and from Yerevan, meanwhile, are finding different ways of coping with the shortages. Russia’s Aeroflot now operates Moscow-Yerevan flights with smaller and more economical aircraft. “We have been forced to carry fewer people and less baggage and load more fuel on our way from Moscow,” said its representative in Yerevan, Gamarnik Ghahramanian. “It’s hard to operate like this.”

Armenia’s flagship carrier, Armavia, has dealt with the problem by having its planes land in the southern Russian city of Sochi for refueling. Passengers complain that they now need at least fours to reach Moscow instead of the normal two and a half hours. The delays could be even longer. On October 31, for example, an Armavia passenger jet bound for Moscow was forced to return to Yerevan after failing to refuel at Sochi airport.

Officials at the Armenian government’s Civil Aviation Department say Mika Limited has pledged to remedy the situation “in the next few days.” However, the company has already given such promises before.
Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty

List of airline personnel (in Russian)
http://forum.armkb.com/showpost.php?p=439206&postcount=73

MOSCOW (AP) - An Armenian passenger plane crashed in stormy weather early Wednesday off Russia’s Black Sea coast as it was headed in for a landing, killing all 113 people on board, emergency officials said.

The Airbus A-320, which belonged to the Armenian airline Armavia, disappeared from radar screens about four miles from the shore and crashed after making a turn toward the Adler airport near the southern Russian city of Sochi, Emergency Situations Ministry spokesman Viktor Beltsov said. Rescue officials in the ministry’s southern regional branch said all 113 people aboard the plane, including six children, were killed.

Armavia officials said they believed the crash was due to the weather, but Sergei Kubinov, regional head of the Emergency Situations Ministry, said the age of the aircraft and technical problems could have been involved. Investigators did not believe terrorism was a factor.

[…]

The plane disappeared from radar at about 2:15 a.m. local time during a flight from Yerevan to Sochi, Beltsov said. He said the plane went down while trying to make a repeat attempt at an emergency landing; the Interfax news agency quoted the Russian air control agency as saying that the plane’s crew had not reported an emergency.

Andrei Agadzhanov, Armavia’s deputy commercial director, said the crew had communicated with Sochi ground controllers while the plane was flying over the Georgian capital, Tbilisi. The ground controllers reported stormy weather but told the crew the plane could still land, he said.

Just before the landing, however, the ground controllers told the plane’s pilots to circle again before approaching the airport. Then the plane crashed.

Agadzhanov said that the airline’s deputy general director, Vyacheslav Yaralov, had been aboard. He said the crew was experienced and that the bad weather was “certainly'’ the cause.

CNN has news of the crash as a developing story on its web site.