American Cessna Fails to Cope With Russia’s Snow
Privately-owned Cessna 208 Caravan I crashed in the Stupino District, the Moscow Region, late November 19, 2005. All passengers of the plane – sons of State Duma’s deputy Nikolay Olshansky and former head of Voronezh Municipal Committee Vladimir Anishchev, their four friends and two pilots – died in the aviation accident, attributed to the icing and pilot’s failure to cope with it.
Legally owned by the South American Denton Invest & Trade Corp, one-engine and rather light Cessna was usually stationed in Voronezh airport. Its operator was Evolga, which, like the South American firm, is controlled by Nikolay Olshansky and his son Igor Olshansky, co-owners of Minudobreniya (Mineral Fertilizers)
Minudobpreniya produced 891,800 tons of ammonia, 488,900 tons of ammonium nitrate, 960,600 tons of nitroammophoska and 744,100 tons of nitric acid in 2004. Sales revenues reached 6.57 billion rubles; net profit was 1.15 billion rubles.
The plane had been recently used by Igor Olshansky. Past Saturday, he was hunting in the woods of Voronezh in company of Dmitry Anishchev, co-owner of ExpressAvia, Alexander Lazko, who headed one of the Moscow construction firms, guard Vladimir Sidorov and two women. The young people wanted to pass Sunday in Moscow, so they arrived at the municipal airport by 9:00 p.m., where crew’s captain Gennady Piyanykh and pilot Oleg Gunkin were waiting for them.
The plane took off in no time and headed for the Domodedovo airport of Moscow. Pianykh reported he was getting ready for landing at around 10:25 p.m., when the plane was flying over the Moscow Region. He got OK and set to descending the aircraft. After that, the contact with Cessna broke and the radars missed it.
Inhabitants of Staroe-village, 10 kilometers from Stupino, started calling the police in a few minutes to say they have heard a heavy explosion and see the flames of fire.
The plane, or to be more precise its wreckage, was found on the skirts of the wood. Nearly all trees near the crash have survived, so the plane might have nose dived to the land, one of the rescuers pointed out.
According to the experts, the most possible course of the crash is ice formation. The pilots say Cessna has been originally designed for warm climate and its anti-icing system is far from the best. Its wings are placed rather high above the body, so Cessna makes a nosedive in time of releasing the edge flaps. This nosedive is particularly dangerous if there is icing and may result in prolonged nosing down of the aircraft.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Nov. 21, 2005
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