Iran says black boxes of down-and-out Ukraine jet show missiles hit 25 seconds apart

DUBAI (Reuters) – Analysis from the black boxes of a descending Ukrainian passenger plane shows that it was hit by two missiles 25 seconds apart and that passengers were still alive for a while after the impact of the first explosion, Iran said on Sunday.

The announcement by the head of Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization marks the first official report on the contents of the cockpit voice and data recordings, which were sent to France for reading in July.

Tehran has said it accidentally killed the Ukrainian plane in January at a time of extreme tensions with the United States. All 176 people on board the plane were killed.

The second missile hit the plane 25 seconds after the first, but only 19 seconds from that hole was caught on the shots due to damage from the first rocket, Touraj Dehghani-Zanganeh was quoted as saying by state television.

“Nineteen seconds after the first rocket hit the plane, the voices of pilots in the cockpit indicated that the passengers were alive … 25 seconds later the second rocket hit the plane,” he was told.

“Therefore, no analysis of the performance and effects of the second rocket was obtained from the black box of the aircraft.”

The plane’s flight crew – two pilots and an instructor who also traveled in the cockpit – tried to keep control of the plane until the last minute, Zanganeh said.

Iranian Revolutionary Guards shot down the Ukraine International Airlines flight with a ground-to-air missile on January 8, just after the plane took off from Tehran, in what Tehran later acknowledged as a “disastrous mistake” by troops on high alert during a confrontation with the United States.

Iran has been in talks with Ukraine, Canada and other peoples who had civilians on board the downed plane, and who have demanded a thorough investigation into the incident.

Iranian and Ukrainian officials have also held talks on compensation to the families of the victims. Another round of talks is set for October.

Iran’s investigation is being conducted under United Nations aviation rules that require probes that are only intended to prevent future accidents, separate from any judicial process. But the probe has escalated into regional and domestic tensions.

“The data analysis out of the black boxes should not be politicized,” Zanganeh said.

More than 20 people in Iran have been sentenced to 20 years in prison for participating in peaceful protests against the downing of the plane.

Some Iranians took to Twitter on Sunday to show their anger, with at least one user tweeting “They were alive for 19 seconds … a tragedy”.