TRAGEDY

Iran Blames Misaligned Radar for Ukrainian Flight Crash

A report from Iranian officials claims that the radar in the air defense unit was misaligned, causing the operator to believe there was a second unidentified craft in the air.

Iranian officials blamed the deadly January crash of a Ukrainian passenger jet—shot down by an Iranian missile as it took off from Tehran—on a radar system misalignment in an air defense unit, according to a report published on Saturday. The crash, which killed all 176 passengers on the flight, came after days of extreme tensions between Iran and the United States over the surprise killing of Tehran’s top general Qassem Soleimani. The Iranian government waited until several days after the crash to come forward with the information that its officials had fired an antiaircraft missile at the plane shortly after it had taken off from Imam Khomeini International Airport. According to the new report, the radar was misaligned by 107 degrees, which reportedly caused the missile operator to misunderstand the passenger craft’s location and believe there was another unidentified aircraft in the area. The operator then contacted a higher authority, but receiving no response, fired at the plane, the report said. The report does not name the individuals involved in the missile’s firing.