Russian SU27 follow A340
 

Finnish media reports that two Russian Suhoi 27 fighters appeared behind a Finnair Airbus A340 flying the new Helsinki-Seoul South Korea route this past Wednesday. The fighters appeared aft of the A340 soon after the airliner had entered Russian airspace and flew at a distance of only a few hundred meters behind the airliner. Onboard was the Finnish Prime Minister and some 200 pax. According to international regulations the pilots of the A340 should have been advised if fighters are approaching the aircraft for any reason. According to Finnish ATC reps the Finnair pilots were not so informed and neither did they notice the fighters.

Sounds scary to think the Russians are using commercial airlines for target practise or as a political tool. I hope the Russian are required to explain their action.

No target practice, just a normal courtesy of arranging an escort for the P.M.
Why it was not relayed to the Finnair crew, this I do not know, perhaps the ATC ran short of English words at that point. And why any P.M. travels on a scheduled flight is also unbelievable, but that is another matter.

now mr H.Finn explain why you find it difficult to comprehend why any PM flies on a sched flight? In this day and age with fuel prices through the roof the most efficent way for a pm is through a sched flight for big distances saving the tax payers mega money. Granted the likes of George B etc have to travel in their own bubble, norm PMs from norm countries should be able to slum it with the rest of us

As it was the inaugural flight it would be a bit strange if the senior politician travelling to formally open the new route at the ceremony when they got to Seoul were to travel in a different aircraft !

In Sweden both our P.M. and the King frequentley travel on scheduled flights. The King is a lot more friendly the the P.M.

Didn't Blair go with his family on a Ryanair flight a few years ago?

I think it would be a security risk to other passengers if Bush did the same. I would offload myself from such a flight.

Even the Queen flies on scheduled services every now and then.

Some of the flights I have travelled on appeared to have several queens in the cabin :E :}

The very first Finnair flight to Korea took place on Monday, the PM:s flight on Wednesday. Anyway, the latest local news says the Finnish aviation authorities have confirmed the Russian planes were on a "normal identification mission" which, however, had not been reported to Finnair in advance as would have been advisable.

Surely Not :

"Some of the flights I have travelled on appeared to have several queens in the cabin"

Rofl but be careful - you'll have Tim McLelland (spl?) on this thread like a sheet of pink chiffon !

Apparently it's common practice for the US Navy to intercept and Identify commercial aircraft flying within 200 miles of a carrier battle group. They send up a F18 to obtain the rego of the aircraft, this is done from close up.

I was told this by a US Navy F 14 Pilot 3 years ago.

Nice photo of the 707 on the ice. What ever happened to it? I guess the Russkies kept all the Western "technology" and cut the rest up later.

As far as I know, the ice on the lake melted and the 707 sunk to the bottom before they could recover the plane from the spot. This happened in Karelia, which under the Soviet rule became a rather backward, impoverished province.

Forgive the obvious question, but if nobody told the pilots of the 340 of their escort, how do we have the details of this story? I don't believe for a second that pax can see a 'couple of hundred metres' behind the a/c from their seats either.

And 'target practice'? F***s sake! Even the Daily Mail would struggle to reach that sensationalist piece of claptrap! :ugh:

According to the news networks, the general manager of Helsinki-Vantaa airport, who is a former FiAF fighter pilot, was travelling with the PM and saw the fighters, identifying them as Flankers, which gives the story some credibility. Otherwise, is been a slow news day so no wonder these stories get attention.

Russian fighters DO creep up on airliners without crews knowing. They crept up on a Virgin or BA (don´t remember which, Tokyo-London flight) flight in international waters north of Norway last summer.
NATO EW unit alerted ATC which alerted the crew.
F-16s attended and ended the "chase".

I find the Finnairs story very much plausable.

Finn47 said...

"As far as I know, the ice on the lake melted and the 707 sunk to the bottom before they could recover the plane from the spot."


Aviate wonders what the trees did? Sink with the 707? :)

Seems you are most likely right. The long told semi-official version of the 707 story said the plane sunk. However, this later version, sometime after 1997, says the plane was actually dismantled and transported somewhere else. Story on a Finnish website here:

http://heninen.net/flight-902/english.htm

posted elsewhere
 

''...Korean Boeing was shot down in Karelia, Russia in 1978, with a lot of civil passengers on-board. The pilots of the plane had mysteriously altered the route so that came deep inside Russian territory. Two and a half hours they were escorted by Russian jet fighters not responding to any radio contact or visual contact attempts. At last the Soviet military commanders ordered to shoot the plane down with as much accuracy as they could do. The jet plane of Russian army hit the Boeing with a missile cutting off the piece of its wing, so the Korean plane had to land after this. Two passengers were killed others got wounds as a result of an extremely fast landing to the frozen Russian lake in Karelia, Russia near Kem’ town. The first Russian military police group arrived in two hours to the landing site. They tell that when they entered the plane the strong smell of “blood, alcohol and human fecal masses” hit into their noses. Afterwards the passengers spent three days in the Kem’ town, Karelia, Russia and were send to Helsinki, Finland on the plane on the fourth day. The crew was taken to Moscow and was questioned there, but later they returned to Korea. The plane itself was disassembled to smallest parts and sent to Russian airplane producing factories and research centers..''

The Finnish media report that the Flankers appeared when the A340 was flying half way between Lake Ladoga and Lake Onega, northeast of St. Petersburg. It just happens that the Russian Air Force has a base almost directly below, called Lodeynoye Pole. Look it up in Google Earth and by my count you can see some 28 Flankers parked there, so that must be where the Flankers came from.

One final touch: the Finnish Broadcasting Corp YLE has finally something available in English for people to read, mostly about the politics of it all:

http://www.yle.fi/news/id92977.html

...and the picture must be a file photo, of course.

Seems to happen farily regularly around the world. One of our aircraft, on task out of RAF Akrotiri was intercepted by a pair of US Marine Corps Hornets last year. They came along-side checked him out and left.....but only after Akrotiri had explained to the carrier group what he was doing "off airways" in that position....glad in wasn't the Vincennes!