Prigozhin's plane appeared fine on radar until last 30 seconds
The Embraer Legacy 600 executive jet believed to have carried Wagner mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin to his death on Wednesday showed no sign of problem until a precipitous drop in its final 30 seconds, according to flight-tracking data.
Rosaviatsia, Russia's aviation agency said Prigozhin, who led an aborted mutiny in June, was one of 10 people on board the downed plane. It was traveling from Moscow to St Petersburg when it crashed near the village of Kuzhenkino in the Tver Region, Russia's emergency situations ministry said.
At 15:19 GMT, the aircraft made a "sudden downward vertical", said Ian Petchenik of Flightradar24. Within about 30 seconds, the aircraft had plummeted more than 8,000 feet from its cruising altitude of 28,000 feet.
"Whatever happened, happened quickly," Petchenik said.
"They may have been wrestling [with the aircraft] after whatever happened," Petchenik said. But prior to its dramatic drop, there was "no indication that there was anything wrong with this aircraft".
The jet was identified on Flightradar24 with registration RA-02795, the same as the plane that carried Prigozhin to Belarus after Wagner's June mutiny, an industry source familiar with the matter said.
Flightradar24 last recorded the position of the aircraft at 15:11 GMT, before the crash. Jamming or interference in the area probably slowed the collection of further location data.
Other data continued for nine minutes. Flightradar24 said the jet went thorough a series of ascents and descents of a few thousand feet each over 30 seconds before its final, disastrous plunge. Flightradar24 received its final data on the jet at 15:20.
(Reuters)