THE HAGUE, Oct 13 – The Dutch Safety Board confirmed that Malaysia Airlines MH17 was shot down by a Russian Buk missile fired from surface to air system over eastern Ukraine last year. They said at a presentation today that the plane should never have been flying there as Ukraine should have closed its airspace to civil aviation.
They said there were ‘nobody gave any thought’ to the risk. The report issued says states in civil conflict must do more in the future to protect passenger planes. As the world heard what was in the final report, the remaining fuselage was unveiled, Dutch investigators unveiled a ghostly reconstruction of the forward section of MH17, the Malaysian airliner shot down over Ukraine last year.
The Dutch Safety Board chairman, Tjibbe Joustra said in a press conference at the Gilze-Rijen air base in southern Netherlands that the missile’s warhead detonated on the left side of the aircraft’s cockpit. He said MH17 was shot down by a BUK surface-to-air missile. He said when presenting the final report on the MH17 tragedy at the Gilze-Rijen air base, Netherlands on Tuesday, which was aired live via international media.
MH17 was shot down while cruising at an altitude of 30,000ft and crashed in a tense area of Ukraine near the Russian border on July 17, 2014. All 283 passengers and 15 crew onboard the Boeing 777 aircraft, which was en route to Kuala Lumpur from Amsterdam, perished.
