Zaroshchenskoye vs Pervomaisky: experts argue where from the Buk flew to Boeing MH17

Ivan Zubov

The trial in The Hague over the death of the Malaysian passenger Boeing MH17 and 298 of its passengers continues. Recall that on July 17, 2014, a Malaysian airliner operated a scheduled flight on the Amsterdam-Kuala Lumpur route, but about 2 hours and 49 minutes after takeoff, it was hit by a 9M38 series missile fired from the Buk anti-aircraft missile system and collapsed into several parts. The international investigation team concluded that the Buk belonged to the 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade of the Air Defense Forces of the Russian Ground Forces and was brought to the territory from which the shot was fired from Russia. All alternative versions at the trial in The Hague were declared untenable by the prosecution. However, the Russian side does not give up and is trying to prove that the ill-fated Buk flew in from Ukrainian territory, citing its own arguments. Technical expert Vadim Lukashevich is sure that they are false and proves it, as they say, on his fingers:

“Any complex issue can always be reduced to its essence - and everything will become clear and understandable.

Now I will show you what the most heated debates were going on in the court of The Hague and what, as a reinforced concrete argument of the innocence of the defendant Oleg Pulatov (read - Russia), his defense rests. And you yourself will see everything clearly.

The Buk missiles (9M38 and 9M38M1) have a small metal plate in the tail section, which closes the tearing connector at the moment of launch.

So, after a rocket explosion near the Malaysian Boeing, a small fragment of this plate got stuck in the leftmost pillar of the pilot's cabin glazing, was found there, cut out and examined. And it undoubtedly belongs to a Buk missile, against which Almaz-Antey does not argue.

And now I ask for your attention.

A technical investigation by the Dutch Safety Board (DSB) and a criminal investigation by the international Joint Investigation Team (JIT) concluded that the rocket came from the direction of the village of Pervomaisky south of Snezhnoye, and the position of this rocket fragment proves this.

The Russian concern Almaz-Antey categorically asserts that a missile was launched from the vicinity of Zaroshchensky, and the position of this fragment, they say, only confirms the launch from Zaroshchensky and completely refutes the approach from Snezhnoye. The whole question of the location of the rocket launch came together in court like a wedge of light, precisely on this one - what this piece of the rocket proves and what it refutes.

Throughout March, the defense argued, citing and referring to Almaz-Antey, that only with the position of the rocket at the time of the explosion corresponding to the approach from Zaroshchenskoye, this fragment of the rocket could get to where it was found. And when starting from Pervomaisky, he couldn’t get there in principle, because he couldn’t, because well, he just couldn’t completely completely and that’s it. Well, there is no such trajectory that during the explosion of a rocket in the orientation "from Pervomaisky" this fragment of the rocket hit the glazing frame where it was found.

In contrast to this, experts from the National Aerospace Laboratory of the Netherlands, as well as experts from the Royal Military Academy of Belgium, prove the opposite - that only when approaching "from Pervomaisky" does this fragment without any problems get into the extreme pillar of the glazing binding, but when oriented "from Zaroshchenskoye" (attention again!) he basically could not get there, because in this case he would inevitably have to get into the previous (in the course of his flight) rack of binding, and not into the last one. That is, geometrically there is no such trajectory along which this fragment from the rear of the rocket at the time of the explosion could FAIRLY get where it hit.

Now you know the essence of the most bitter disputes between the prosecution and the defense in the court of The Hague in the MH17 case.

So Zaroshchenskoye or Pervomayskoye? In other words, is the prosecution or the defense lying? The court will not say this until November, but you can answer it now.

We take the Boeing 777-200ER 3D model verified according to the developer's drawings and place the Buk missile in it in two versions - in the coordinates of the detonation point and orientation according to Almaz-Antey and similarly according to DSB / JIT, and look at the flight paths of this a fragment of the tail of the rocket, and where is which trajectory that clings or not.

I'll just clarify the picture a bit. The rocket in both cases explodes at a height of 3 meters above the aircraft, so the trajectory (red line) of the fragment's flight has an inclination from the rocket to the aircraft. And in order to get to the “right” place in the Almaz-Antey version, it must hook the skin at the blue point, and then (already the blue section of the trajectory) collide with the glazing frame and get stuck in the previous binding post between the panes.

Draw your own conclusions…”