Ptkay, can't comment on Ershov statement /link as Smolensk blog didn't go into details this time discussing what Ershov said. Only brief comments "this time Ershov may be right" :o)
(thing is we there fell out with Ershov :o) after he critised the Smolensk chaps in a comment elsewhere as "amateurs crawling the ground checking for land marks for nothing when all is clear" :o)))))))
the blog unanimously gave him thumbs down :o), especially that the first Ershov comment didn't prove true so far (idea the plane deviated leftwards of the runway on purpose, taking some lights mistakingly as orientation. Whereas in fact it was our very birch tree, and then more of them, found by Smolesnk blog on the ground exactly :o)
So we are minimalistic in wording, re each other, ever after :o) (Ershov and the blog)
He said a plane cannot deviate leftwards after hitting a tree! That a tree is nothing for a plane, it's as if "someone caught by hand an ear of the running elefant - the arm is more likely to fly away together with that ear, but even the torn off ear won't change the elefant's running route!"
(how he dared :o). the plane's balance changed after it a wing to the tree. in this sense an ear can change the elefants' running direction)
Anyway Ershov summary in comment 2 is the crew were poor babies sent by some idiots into the fog, well knowing the aerodrome of destination is in fog and poor visibility, thus knowing the landing will have to be performed blind, by devices, and well knowing this crew is not trained for that but for modern airports and automated systems instead)
(there is also a pilot's minima discussed, like, in Russia as min there is an airplane minima, an aerodrome equipment minima, the weather minima - AND a pilot's qualification minima - allowing him to do some things and not allowing to perform other. pilots are awarded with their degrees of the ? trickiness /difficulties they can manage, formally, via exams' system here.
It is widely believed these pilots didn't pass exams allowing blind landing by 2 Beakon's equipped aerodrome only, in TU154 aircraft type)