BAKU, Azerbaijan, Jan. 11
By Elnur Baghishov - Trend:
The black box of the Ukrainian passenger plane, crashed near the city of Parand in Iran's Tehran province on Jan. 8, will be sent to France to be deciphered, the Director General of the Accident and Incident Investigation Office of Iran Civil Aviation Organization (CAO) Hassan Rezaifar said, Trend reports via IRNA.
Although all the possible ways have been tried to decipher the black box, it turned out impossible due to the lack of technology in Iran for such modern aircraft, Rezaifar said.
Therefore, the black box could be damaged if opened in Iran, he added.
Appeals were made to Canada and the US to send the necessary equipment to decipher the black box to Iran, but they turned them down, Rezaifar said.
The CAO official noted that France has been chosen to send the black box, due to the fact that Iran has cooperation agreement with this country on deciphering black boxes.
The Ukrainian International Airlines (UIA) flight crashed just minutes after takeoff from Tehran on Jan.8, killing all 176 people on board.
The Boeing 737-800 was headed for Kyiv, where 138 passengers were expected to take a connecting flight to Canada.
Iran's Armed Forces General Staff issued a statement on Jan. 11 saying that the aircraft was shot down by the Iranian Air Defense System.