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The General Staff of Iran’s Armed Forces has released the first investigation into the circumstances of a recent chopper crash that killed Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and his entourage.
Following the incident, a top inquiry committee made up of experts, specialists, and technicians arrived at the scene on Monday morning, according to the semi-official Tasnim news agency, citing a report from Iran’s General Staff on Friday.
According to the investigation, the helicopter kept on its set course throughout the flight and did not stray from it.
According to the investigation, the pilot of the wrecked helicopter contacted the other two helicopters in the President’s escort about a minute and a half before the tragedy.
No trace of bullets or similar items have been detected on the wreckage of the crashed helicopter, it added as quoted by Xinhua news agency report.
After crashing into the mountain, the helicopter had caught fire, it said.
“Complications of the region, fog, and low temperature” had caused the search and rescue operations to continue until nightfall and then throughout the night, the report said, adding, “At 5 a.m. local time on Monday, with the assistance of drones, the exact location of the incident was identified.”
No suspicious issue had been detected in the conversations between the watchtower and the flight crew, it added.
More details would be provided after further investigations, it said.
Raisi and his party were en route to East Azerbaijan province when their chopper crashed in a hilly terrain on Sunday.
Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian and Iranian Supreme Leader’s delegate to East Azerbaijan, Mohammad Ali Ale-Hashem, were also on board the chopper.
Raisi was laid to rest on Thursday at Imam Reza’s sacred shrine in his hometown of Mashhad, in northeast Iran.
Source:IANS
