Korean Air Lines Flight 007

"Flight 007" redirects here. For the LOT Polish Airlines incident with the same flight number, see LOT Polish Airlines Flight 007.

Korean Air Lines Flight 007

Artist's rendition of HL7442, the KAL 747 lost during Flight 007.
Occurrence
Date	September 1, 1983
Summary	Airliner shoot down
Site	West of Sakhalin Island 46°34′N 141°17′E
Aircraft
Aircraft type	Boeing 747-230B
Operator	Korean Air Lines
Registration	HL7442
Flight origin	John F. Kennedy International Airport New York City, New York United States
Last stopover	Anchorage International Airport Anchorage, Alaska United States
Destination	Gimpo International Airport, Seoul South Korea
Passengers	240
Crew	29
Fatalities	269
Survivors	0

Korean Air Lines Flight 007, also known as KAL 007, was a Korean Air Lines civilian airliner shot down by Soviet jet interceptors on September 1, 1983 just west of Sakhalin island. 269 passengers and crew, including US congressman Lawrence McDonald, were aboard KAL 007; there were no known survivors.

The aircraft had violated Soviet airspace and the Soviet Union stated it did not believe the aircraft was civilian and said that it believed it had entered Soviet airspace as a deliberate provocation by the United States, the purpose being to test its military response capabilities, repeating the provocation of Korean Air Flight 902, also shot down by Soviet aircraft over the Kola Peninsula in 1978.

The incident attracted a storm of protest from across the world, particularly from the United States.

Flight and passenger information

Korean Air Lines Flight 007 was a commercial Boeing 747-230B (registration: HL7442, formerly D-ABYH, was previously operated by Condor Airlines) flying from New York City, United States to Seoul, South Korea. The aircraft—piloted by Chun Byung-in—departed Gate 15, 35 minutes behind its scheduled departure time of 11:50 P.M. local time, and took off from New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport on August 31. After refueling at Anchorage International Airport in Anchorage, Alaska, the aircraft departed for Seoul while carrying 240 passengers and 29 crew at 13:00 GMT (3:00 AM local time) on September 1. KAL 007 flew westward and then turned south on a course for Seoul-Kimpo International Airport that took it much farther west than planned, cutting across the Soviet Kamchatka Peninsula and then over the Sea of Okhotsk towards Sakhalin, violating Soviet airspace more than once.

The flight attendants included fourteen women and twelve men. 12 passengers occupied the upper deck first class. Passengers occupied almost all of the 24 business class seats. In economy class almost 80 seats had no passengers. 130 passengers planned to connect to other destinations such as Tokyo, Hong Kong, and Taiwan; they flew Korean Air Lines due to its fares.

The nationalities of the passengers were: Republic of Korea 105, United States 62, Japan 28, Taiwan 23, Philippines 16, Hong Kong 12, Canada 8, Thailand 5, Australia 2, United Kingdom 2, Dominican Republic 1, India 1, Islamic Republic of Iran 1, Malaysia 1, Sweden 1, Vietnam 1.

KAL 007's Flight Deviation until Attack

Delayed one hour because of strong tail winds (to avoid arriving at Kimpo airport prior to its work opening at 6 A.M.), KAL 007 departed Anchorage International Airport at 13:00 GMT (4:00 a.m. Alaskan time). It was the practice of Korean Airlines to sometimes delay a flight so that it would not arrive at Kimpo Airport in Seoul, Korea prior to 6:00 a.m., as customs and passenger handling personnel began their operations at that time. Climbing, the jumbo jet turned left, seeking its assigned route J501, which would soon take it onto the northernmost of five 50-mile wide passenger plane air corridors that bridge the Alaskan and Japanese coasts. These five corridors are called the NOPAC (North Pacific) routes. KAL 007’s particular corridor, Romeo 20, passed just 17 1/2 miles from Soviet airspace off the Kamchatka coast.

At about 10 minutes after take-of, KAL 007 began to deviate to the right (north) of its assigned route. ICAO analysis of the Flight Data recorder provides no reason for this deviation

At 28 minutes after takeoff, civilian radar at Kenai, on the eastern shore of Cook Inlet and 53 nautical miles southwest of Anchorage, with a radar coverage of 175 miles west of Anchorage, tracked KAL 007 5.6 miles north of where it should have been. Where it should have been was a location “fixed” by the nondirectional radio beacon (NDB) of Cairne Mountain.

KAL 007 continued on its night journey, having previously received clearance (13:02:40 GMT) to proceed “direct Bethel” when able. Bethel is a small fishing village on the western tip of Alaska, 350 nautical miles west of Anchorage. It is the last U. S. mainland navigational point . But KAL 007 did not make Bethel for at 50 minutes after takeoff, military radar at King’s Salmon, Alaska, tracked KAL 007 at a full 12.6 nautical miles north of where it should have been. It had exceeded its permissible leeway of deviation by six times (two nautical miles an hour error is the permissible drift from course set by INS).

Halfway between waypoint NABIE in its Inertial Navigation System (INS) guided flight, and not yet having reached its next required reporting waypoint, NEEVA, KAL 007 passed through the southern portion of the United States Air Force NORAD (North American Air Defense) buffer zone. This zone, monitored intensively by U. S. Intelligence assets, lies north of Romeo 20, KAL 007’s designated air route, and is off-limits to civilian aircraft. KAL was apparently undetected—or, if detected, unreported.

And so KAL 007 continued its night journey, ever increasing its deviation—60 nautical miles off course at waypoint NABIE, 100 nautical miles off course at waypoint NUKKS, and 160 nautical miles off course at waypoint NEEVA—until it penetrated Kamchatka’s borders

At 15:51 GMT, according to Soviet sources, KAL 007 “bumped” the Soviet buffer zone of Kamchatka Peninsula. The buffer zone was generally considered to extend 200 km. from Kamchatka’s coast and is technically known as a Flight Information Region (FIR). The 200 km buffer zone is counterpart to the United States’ Aerospace Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ), but the 100 km radius of the buffer zone nearest to Soviet territory had the additional designation of Air Defense Zone. Heightened surveillance measures would be taken against any non-Soviet aircraft entering the Air Defense Zone.

"Worst of all Nights"

August 31/September 1, 1983 was the worst possible night for KAL 007 to “bump the buffer” for a complexity of reasons—all of them ominous. It was but a few short hours before the time that Marshal Nikolai Ogarkov, Soviet Chief of General Staff, had set for the test firing of the SS-25, an illegal (according to SALT II agreements) mobile Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM). The SS-25 was to be launched from Plesetsk, the launch site in northwest Russia which was used for test firing of solid fuel propellant ICBMs—24 minutes later to land in the Klyuchi target area on the Kamchatka Peninsula. Home to the Soviet Far East Fleet Inter Continental Ballistic Missile Nuclear Submarine base, as well as several air bases and Air Defense Missile launching batteries, Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky on the southern coast of Kamchatka was bristling with weaponry.

Interception

The Sukhoi Su-15 NATO codename Flagon was a Soviet interceptor.

Soviet air defense units had been tracking the aircraft for more than an hour while it entered and left Soviet airspace over the Kamchatka Peninsula. Soviet aircraft had initially tried to contact the pilot of the aircraft by radio and by making visual contact. When this failed, the pilot of the lead aircraft reported firing 120 rounds of tracer ammunition in four 30-round bursts and the pilot of KAL 007 still failed to respond. The order to shoot down the airliner was given as it was about to leave Soviet airspace for the second time after flying over Sakhalin Island. It was probably downed in international airspace. The lead aircraft of two Su-15 Flagon interceptors scrambled from Dolinsk-Sokol airbase fired two air to air missiles around 18:26 GMT, and shot down KAL 007. The airliner crashed into the sea north of Moneron Island, killing all on board. Initial reports that the airliner had been forced to land on Sakhalin were soon proved false. Transcripts recovered from the airliner's cockpit voice recorder indicate that the crew were unaware that they were off course and violating Soviet airspace (at the end they were 500 kilometres to the west of the planned track). After the missile strike, the aircraft began to descend from 18:26 until the end of the recording at 18:27:46. At the time of the attack, the plane had been cruising at an altitude of about 35,000 feet. Capt. Chun was able to turn off the autopilot (18:26:46) and it is unknown whether he was able to regain control as the aircraft spiraled toward the ocean until the cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder stopped 1 minute later.

Soviet harassment of U.S. search and rescue

From early in September until the beginning of November, the US with the Japanese and South Koreans carried out joint Search and Rescue and then Search and Salvage operations. These missions met increasing hostile interference by the Soviets. These harassments and hostile activities, all in violation of the 1972 Incident at Sea agreement, included the following: false flag and fake light signals, sending an armed boarding party to threaten to board a U.S. chartered Japanese auxiliary vessel (blocked by U.S. warship interposition), moving U.S. sonars, setting false "pingers" in deep international waters, sending Backfire bombers armed with air-to-surface nuclear-armed missiles to threaten U.S. naval units, and radar lock-ons by a Soviet missile cruiser and a destroyer targeting U.S. naval vessels.

Crash scene

According to the ICAO: "The location of the main wreckage was not determined ... The approximate position was 46°34′N 141°17'E, which was in international waters." This point is about 41 miles (66 km) from Moneron Island and about 45 miles (72 km) from the shore of Sakhalin 33 miles (53 km) from the point of attack

It was reported at the time that "Russian naval and air search units ... have barred the U.S. and Japanese search forces from the exact area where the 747 is believed to have crashed, even though that spot is beyond the 12 mi (19 km). territorial limit from Sakhalin Island."

Here are the After Action Report statements, however, of the Commander of the U.S. Search and Rescue/Salvage Task Force 71 of the 7th Fleet, Admiral Walter Piotti, to his belief that KAL 007 had not come down in international waters but rather in Soviet territorial waters: "Had TF [task force] 71 been permitted to search without restriction imposed by claimed territorial waters, the aircraft stood a good chance of having been found.”...“No wreckage of KAL 007 was found. However, the operation established, with a 95% or above confidence level, that the wreckage, or any significant portion of the aircraft, does not lie within the probability area outside the 12 nautical miles (22 km) area claimed by the Soviets as their territorial limit.”

Lynn Helms, Federal Aviation Administrator, stated at a hearing of ICAO on Sept. 15, 1983 that "the U.S.S.R.has refused to permit search and rescue units from other countries to enter Soviet territorial waters to search for the remains of KAL 007. Moreover, the Soviet Union has blocked access to the likely crash site and has refused to cooperate with other interested parties, to ensure prompt recovery of all technical equipment, wreckage and other material."

Six days later, the Soviets turned over another non-human 76 items. On December 19 1983, the Soviets surrendered yet another 83 small items, bringing the total of all items recovered to 1,020 Life magazine reported: "The Russians picked up 18 articles of clothing and sent them to Japan -- but only after having them drycleaned."

The Human Remains

Surface

No bodies, body parts or tissues were reported recovered by the Russians from the surface of the sea in their own territorial waters and none were recovered by the US-S. Korean-Japanese Search and Rescue/Salvage operations in international waters at designated crash site and within 225 sq. nautical mile search area.

Subsurface

Since there was a total absence of human remains (as well as a total absence of luggage) both on the surface of the sea in the 225 sq. miles of probability impact area in international waters and in the Soviet territorial waters, it was thought that passengers and luggage would be found incarcerated in the wreckage of the aircraft below the surface at the final resting place of the jumbo jet. But from within the wreckage of KAL 007 at an undesignated location at the bottom of the sea (see below divers reports), out of the 269 occupants of the aircraft, there were only 10 encounters with passenger remains (tissues and body parts) and one partial torso (disembowled).

In 1991 Izvestia published a series of interviews with civilian divers who had visited the wreckage of KAL 007 and the assumed resting place of its 269 passengers and crew on the ocean floor near Moneron Island starting two weeks after the shootdown:

“I did not miss a single dive. I have quite a clear impression: The aircraft was filled with garbage, but there were really no people there. Why? Usually when an aircraft crashes, even a small one... As a rule there are suitcases and bags, or at least the handles of the suitcases.” From Captain Mikhail Igorevich Girs’ diary: "Submergence 10 October. Aircraft pieces, wing spars, pieces of aircraft skin, wiring, and clothing. But—no people. The impression is that all of this has been dragged here by a trawl rather than falling down from the sky". "So we were ready to encounter a virtual cemetery. But one submergence went by, then the second, and then the third... During the entire rather lengthy period of our work near Moneron, I and my people had maybe ten encounters with the remains of Boeing passengers. No more than that."

Russian responses to the dearth of human remains

The virtual absence of bodies and human remains associated with KAL 007 has elicited various Russian explanations.

The earliest was that there were no bodies found because KAL 007 had but a small complement of military personnel and no civilian passengers. This first version of the spy plane theory was by and large discarded by September 9, 1983, when Marshal Nicolay Ogarkov, U.S.S.R. Chief of General Staff and First Deputy Defense Minister, conceded that there had been civilian passengers aboard KAL 007..

Another theory for the virtual absence of 269 people from the determined crash site is suggested by Soviet correspondent Andrey Illesh in his book, The Mystery of Korean Boeing 747. This theory proposes that the bodies were eaten by giant crabs found in the area. The crab theory has been persistent and been echoed by the Soviet interceptor pilot Gennadie Osipovich himself. Professor William Newman, marine biologist, refuted this theory, stating that crustaceans or sharks would not have touched bone, and that skeletons would have remained.

At Wakkanai and Hokkaido beaches, Japan

Eight days after the shootdown, human remains appeared on the north shore of Hokkaido. Hokkaido began about 30 miles (48 km) below the southern tip of Sakhalin across the Soya Straits (the southern tip of Sakhalin was 35 miles (56 km) from Moneron Island up to the west of Sakhalin). ICAO concluded that these objects were carried from Russian waters to the Japanese shores of Hokkaido by the southerly current west of Sakhalin Island. All currents of the Tsushima straits relevant to Moneron Island flow to the north except this southerly current between Moneron Island and Sakhalin Island. These human remains, including body parts, tissues, and two partial torsos, totaled 13 in number. All were unidentifiable but one partial torso was that of a Caucasian woman - indicated by auburn hair on a partial skull, and one partial body was of an Asian child (with glass imbedded) There was no luggage recovered. Of the non human remains that the Japanese recovered were various items including dentures, newspapers, seats, books, 8 "KAL" paper cups, shoes, sandals, and sneakers, a camera case, a "please fasten seat belt" sign, an oxygen mask, a handbag, a bottle of dish washing fluid, several blouses, an identity card belonging to 25 year old passenger Mary Jane Hendrie of Sault Ste. Marie, Canada, and the business card of passenger Kathy Brown-Spier . All of these items came from only one section of KAL 007 - the passenger cabin including the 747's distinctive hump.

Early reports

On September 1 1983, the New York Times noted: "Early reports said the plane ... had been forced down by Soviet Air Force planes and that all 240 passengers and 29 crew members were believed to be safe." "Korean Foreign Ministry officials cited the United States Central Intelligence Agency as the source for the report that the plane had been forced down on Sakhalin, but American officials in Seoul, Tokyo, and Washington said they could not confirm or deny that report." The informant reported that "the plane had landed at Sakhalin. The crew and passengers are safe." .

Aviation Week & Space Technology for September 5 1983, reported that Korean Air Lines had sent another aircraft "to pick up the passengers and bring them to South Korea."

Investigations

Initial ICAO report

Map showing the divergence of planned and actual flightpaths

The initial International Civil Aviation Organization investigation into KAL 007 was not given access to the Flight Data Recorder (FDR) or the Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) but rather transcripts of the CVR. The ICAO released their initial report Dec. 2, 1983, which concluded that the violation of Soviet airspace was accidental: The autopilot had been set to heading hold after departing Anchorage (an inflight navigational error). It was determined that the crew did not notice this error or subsequently perform navigational checks that would have revealed that the aircraft was diverging further and further from its assigned route. This was later deemed to be caused by a "lack of situational awareness and flight deck coordination".

According to a U.S. Department of State transcript of the shoot down reported by the New York Times, the pilot who shot the plane, Gennady Osipovich, stated that he fired multiple bursts from his cannon prior to releasing the two missiles. The pilot admitted there were no tracers, and these shots could not have been seen by the KAL 007 crew. The Soviets officially maintained that they had attempted radio contact with the airliner and that KAL 007 failed to reply. No other aircraft or ground monitors covering those emergency frequencies at the time reported hearing any such Soviet radio calls. The Soviet pilot reported that KAL 007 was flashing navigation lights, which should have suggested that the plane was civilian. The United States used RC-135s to spy on Russia, and, according to an earlier account, Osipovich feared that the plane could have been an RC-135. In his later 1996 account, Osipovich said "I saw two rows of windows and knew that this was a Boeing. I knew this was a civilian plane. But for me this meant nothing. It is easy to turn a civilian type of plane into one for military use."

Revised ICAO report

On November 18, 1992 Russian President Boris Yeltsin, after a request from American senator Jesse Helms, released both the FDR and CVR of KAL 007 to South Korean President Roh Tae-woo. Initial South Korean research showed the FDR to be empty and the CVR to have an unintelligible copy. The Russians then released the "original recordings" to the ICAO. The ICAO Report continued to support the initial assertion that KAL 007 accidentally flew in Soviet airspace, after listening to the flight crew's conversations recorded by the CVR.

In addition, the Russian Federation released "Transcript of Communications. USSR Air Defence Command Centres on Sakhalin Island" transcripts to ICAO and these are appended to the ICAO '93 Report itself and provided material for analysis for the report. These transcripts (of a number of tracks recordings on two reels) are time specified, some to the second, of the communications between the various command posts and other military facilities on Sakhalin from the time of the initial orders for the shootdown and then through the stalking of KAL 007 by Maj. Osipovoich in his Sukhoi 15 interceptor, the attack as seen and "commented on" by General Kornukov, Commander of Sokol Air Base, down the ranks to the Combat Contoller Lt. Col. Titovnin, the post-attack flight of KAL 007 until it had reached Moneron Island, the descent of KAL 007 over Moneron, the initial Soviet SAR missions to Moneron, the futile search of the "support" interceptors for KAL 007 on the water, and ending with the debriefing of Osipovich on return to base. Some of the communications are the telephone conversations between superior officers and subordinants and involve commands to them, while other communications involve the recorded responses to what was then being viewed on radar tracking KAL 007. These multi-track communications from various command posts telecommunicating at the same minute and seconds as other command posts were communicating provide a "composite" picture of what was taking place .

The Black Box tapes

The first ICAO Report, released on Dec. 2, 1983, included a statement by the Soviet Government claiming "no remains of the victims, the instruments or their components or the flight recorders have so far been discovered" . However, this was shown to be not true by Boris Yeltsin's release of the earlier Nov. 1983 Memo from KGB head Viktor Chebrikov and Defense Minister Dmitry Ustinov to Yuri Andropov. This Memo stated "In the third decade of October this year the equipment in question (the recorder of in-flight parameters and the recorder of voice communications by the flight crew with ground air traffic surveillance stations and between themselves) was brought aboard a search vessel and forwarded to Moscow by air for decoding and translation at the Air Force Scientific Research Institute."

On March 24, 1992, Soviet Defense Minister Dmitri Ustinov admitted on Russian television that he had ordered an all-out effort to retrieve the black boxes in order to "prevent the United States from finding them and to save the Soviet Union from a flurry of international accusations for destoying a civilian airliner".In October 1992 a delegation from the American Association For Families of KAL 007 Victims visiting Moscow at the invitation of President Boris Yeltsin. During a State ceremony at St. Catherine's Hall in the Kremlin the KAL Family Delegation was handed a portfolio containing partial transcripts of the KAL007 Cockpit Voice Recorder — translated into Russian — and documents of the Politburo pertaining the September 1, 1983 tragedy. At the conclusion of a three hour Work Meeting with President Yeltsin an investigation Commission under the chairmanship of General Georgy Kondratyev was established which completed its Report in June 1993. Also in June, Yeltsin revealed the existence of a KGB memo reporting the existence of documents related to KAL 007. Speaking in Washington, Yeltsin said, "It was a memorandum from (the) KGB to the Central Committee of the Communist Party where it says that such a tragedy has taken place, and so on and so forth, and that there are documents which would clarify the entire picture. And the next line then says these documents are so well concealed that it is doubtful that our children will be able to find them, those who come after us will be able to find them.". Then in November, President Boris Yeltsin, handed the two Black Box containers to Korean President TohTae-Woo -but not the tapes themselves. The tapes were handed to ICAO on January 8, 1993. They were transcribed by the "Bureau d'Enquete et d'Analyses" (BEA) in Paris in the presence of representatives from Japan, The Russian Federation, South Korea, and the United States.In March 1993 another KAL007 Families delegation was invited back to Moscow where they were given 93 pictures of plane debris - including floating $50 and $100 bills, the voice trancripts - ground to ground, ground to air, air to ground and air to air during the time of the incident and other documents.

The read out of the Cockpit Voice Recorder and the Digital Flight Recorder revealed that the recordings broke off after the first minute and 44 seconds of KAL 007's post missile detonation 12 minute flight. ICAO notes that break off of tape is consonant with a high speed crash while it also concludes that, in fact, there was no high speed crash at that time. No reconciliation of data is provided. "Spliced joints were found at approximately 108, 440, 442, and 463 ft. from the beginning of the tape. The middle two were spaced at a distance corresponding to the length of the tape between the two reels and the last data was recorded between these two joints. It was not unusual for the tape to break as a result of high speed impacts, near where it left the reels.". The remaining minutes of flight would be supplied by the Russia 1992 submission to ICAO of the real-time Soviet military communication of the shootdown and aftermath.

The Soviet Top Secret Memos

The Soviet's communications (from KGB head Viktor Chebrikov and Defence Minister Dmitry Ustinov to Premier of Soviet Union Yury Andropov) confirmed that while they were simulating a search and were harassing the U.S. fleet, they already knew where KAL 007 was, had already boarded her, and had secured for themselves the sought after "Black Box", and had decided to keep this knowledge secret - the reason being that the tapes could not unequivocally support the claim being maintained that the flight of KAL 007 into Soviet Territory was an intelligence mission:

"Simulated search efforts in the Sea of Japan are being performed by our vessels at present in order to dis-inform the US and Japan. These activities will be discontinued in accordance with a specific plan...

"...Therefore, if the flight recorders shall be transferred to the western countries their objective data can equally be used by the USSR and the western countries in proving the opposite view points on the nature of the flight of the South Korean airplane. In such circumstances a new phase in anti-Soviet hysteria cannot be excluded.

"In connection with all mentioned above it seems highly preferable not to transfer the flight recorders to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) or any third party willing to decipher their contents. The fact that the recorders are in possession of the USSR shall be kept secret...

"As far as we are aware neither the US nor Japan has any information on the flight recorders. We have made necessary efforts in order to prevent any disclosure of the information in future.

"Looking to your approval.

"D.Ustinov, V.Chebrikov

"____ December 1983"

That the search efforts of the Soviets were simulated (while the Soviets actually knew the airliner lie elswhere) is also suggested by the article of Mikhail Prozumentshchikov, Deputy Director of the Russian State Archives of Recent History, commemorating the 20th anniversary of the shootdown. Commenting on the Search and Salvage operations, often side by side, of the Soviet and American forces, he writes, "Since the USSR, for natural reasons, knew better where the Boeing had been downed,...it was very problematical to retrieve anything, especially as the USSR was not particularly interested."

American reaction

US President Ronald Reagan condemned the shoot down on September 5, 1983, calling it the "Korean airline massacre," a "crime against humanity [that] must never be forgotten" and an "act of barbarism … [and] inhuman brutality."

The US ambassador to the United Nations, Jeane Kirkpatrick, commissioned an audio-visual presentation in the Security Council using tapes of the Soviet radio conversations and a map of the plane's flight path to depict the shoot-down.

On September 15, President Reagan ordered the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to revoke the license of Aeroflot Soviet Airlines to operate flights into and out of the United States. As a result, Aeroflot flights to North America were only available through cities in Canada or Mexico. Aeroflot service to the United States was not restored until April 29, 1986.

Soviet reaction

The Soviet Government expressed its "regret over the death of innocent victims", but laid the blame for this "criminal, provocative act" on the CIA.

Soviet authorities stated that:

Today, when all versions have been viewed from all possible angles, when leading specialists, including pilots who have flown Boeings for thousands of hours, have declared that three computers could not break down all at once and neither could five radio transmitters, there can be no doubt as to the intentions of the intruder plane.

The Soviet pilots who intercepted the aircraft could not have known that it was a civilian plane. It was flying without the navigation lights, in conditions of poor visibility and did not respond to radio signals.

The Soviet Union stated that the airliner was clearly on a spy mission as it "flew deep into Soviet territory for several hundred kilometres, without responding to signals and disobeying the orders of interceptor fighter planes."

The purpose of this alleged mission was to probe Soviet air defenses over the highly sensitive military sites on the Kamchatka Peninsula and Sakhalin Island.

Controversy

Flight 007 has been the subject of ongoing controversy in America and has spawned a number of conspiracy theories, including allegations that the flight was a spy mission. One of these theories was that Space Shuttle Challenger and a satellite were monitoring the airliner's progress over Soviet territory. Time magazine, which printed this claim, was sued by Korean Air Lines and forced to pay damages as well as print an apology.

The controversy has continued. In 1994, Robert W Allardyce and James Gollin wrote Desired Track: The Tragic Flight of KAL Flight 007, supporting the spy mission theory. In 2007, they reiterated their position in a series of articles in Airways magazine, arguing that the investigation by the International Civil Aviation Organization was a cover-up.

Another controversy is concerned with the flight of the RC-135 reconaissance plane which the U.S. has acknowledged had been about 75 miles from KAL 007 as it was about to enter Soviet airspace. The RC-135 was tasked with capturing the telemetry of the SS-25 missile, illegal according to SALT ll agreements, which the Soviets were to launch that night from Plesetsk in north west Russia to come down in the Klyuchi target range on Kamchatka. Whether the RC -135, configured as a Cobra Ball, was able to pick up the "chatter" from Soviet command posts and capture the radar stations "lighting up" one after another tracking the "intruder" aircraft, as an RC-135 configured as a Rivet Joint could, has been contested.

There has always been a question concerning the capability, and the actualization of that capability, of the RC-135 to become aware of KAL 007 as it penetrated into Soviet air space and to warn it. During the civil litigation for damages to the families of the victims of the shoot-down, Chief Justice of the District Court of Washington, D.C., Aubrey Robinson, ruled out legal recourse to finding out on grounds that it would endanger National Security. He allowed only, on April 18, 1984, questions to the military, "but only in respect to uncovering the legal duty [of the military] to warn or advise civilian aircraft"

In January 1996, Hans Ephraimson, Chairman of the American Association for Families of KAL 007 Victims, claimed that South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan accepted $4 million from Korean Air in order to gain "government protection" during the investigation of the shootdown.

Aftermath

Airway R20 (Romeo 20), the flight path that Korean Air Flight 007 was supposed to fly, which came within 17 miles (27 km) of Soviet airspace at its closest point, was temporarily closed after the accident on September 2. However, pilots and airlines fiercely resisted and the route was reopened on October 2.

The US decided to utilize military radars, extending the radar coverage from Anchorage from 200 to 1,200 miles (1,900 km). These radars had been used in 1968 to alert Seaboard World Airlines Flight 253 in a similar situation. As a result of this incident, Ronald Reagan announced that the Global Positioning System (GPS) would be made available for civilian uses once completed.

Similar incidents

Other civilian airliners have been shot down after straying off course near protected airspace.

• July 27, 1955: El Al Flight 402 a Lockheed L-049 Constellation, registered 4X-AKC, was a flight from Vienna, Austria to Tel Aviv, Israel via Istanbul, Turkey. The aircraft strayed into Bulgarian airspace, was shot down by two Bulgarian Mig-15s and crashed near Petrich, Bulgaria.

• February 21, 1973: Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 114 was shot down by Israeli Air Force F-4 after it strayed into airspace over the Sinai Peninsula which was at the time under Israeli control. After refusing instructions by the F-4 pilots, they then attempted to disable the 727 with carefully aimed bursts of 20mm cannon fire. Unfortunately the damage proved fatal, and Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 114 crashed into a sand dune.

• April 20, 1978: Korean Air Flight 902 was a 707 fired on by an Su-15 Soviet fighter after it had flown over the Kola Peninsula. In this case, like the Libyan Airlines incident, contact was made between the fighter aircraft and the airliner. The pilots of Korean Air Flight 902 tried to escape, but were instead hit by an air-to-air missile, killing two passengers and forcing the aircraft to crash-land on a frozen lake. An investigation into the cause of that incident was complicated by Soviet refusal to release the aircraft's flight data recorders.

See also

• Iran Air Flight 655
• Adam Air Flight 574
• List of airliner shootdown incidents
• List of Korea-related topics

Further reading

• Bamford, James (1983). The Puzzle Palace. Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-006748-5.
• Brun, Michael (1996). Incident at Sakhalin: The True Mission of KAL Flight 007. Four Walls Eight Windows. ISBN 1-56858-054-1. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Clubb, Oliver (1985). KAL Flight 007: The Hidden Story. The Permanent Press. ISBN 0-932966-59-4.
• Dallin, Alexander (1985). Black Box: KAL 007 and the Superpowers. University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-05515-2.
• Gollin, James (1994). Desired Track. American Vision Publishing. ISBN 1-883868-01-7. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Grady, William P. (2005). "KAL 007". Understanding the Times - Volume One: How Satan Turned America From God. Grady Publications. pp. pp. 504-570. ISBN 0-9628809-3-0. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)
• Hersh, Seymour M. (1987). "The Target Is Destroyed": What Really Happened to Flight 007. Vintage. ISBN 0-394-75527-8.
• Johnson, R. W. (1986). Shootdown: Flight 007 and the American Connection. Viking Penguin. ISBN 0-670-81209-9.
• Kirkpatrick, Jeane Jordan (1988). "KAL-007: Violating the Norms of Civil Conduct". Legitimacy and Force. Transaction, Inc. pp. pp. 374-375. ISBN 0-88738-100-6. Retrieved 2007-07-27. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)
• Luttwak, Edward N. (1985). "Delusions of Soviet Weakness". Strategy and History. Transaction, Inc. pp. pp. 241-243. ISBN 0-88738-065-4. Retrieved 2007-07-27. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)
• Pearson, David E. (1987). KAL 007: The Cover-Up. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-671-55716-5.
• Pry, Peter Vincent (1999). "The KAL Crisis, September 1983". War Scare: Russia and America on the Nuclear Brink. Praeger Publishers. pp. pp. 27-31. ISBN 0-275-96643-7. Retrieved 2007-07-27. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)
• Rohmer, Richard (1984). Massacre 007: The Story of the Korean Air Lines Flight 007. Hodder Headline Australia. ISBN 0340364475.
• Schlossberg, Bert (2001). Rescue 007: The Untold Story of KAL 007 and Its Survivors. Xlibris Corp. ISBN 0738857750.
• "Secrets of the Black Box: KAL 007". The History Channel. 2006.
• Snyder, Alvin (1995). Warriors of Disinformation. Arcade Publishing. ISBN 1-55970-389-X.
• St. John, Jeffrey (1984). Day of the Cobra: The True Story of KAL Flight 007. Thomas Nelson. ISBN 0-8407-5381-0.
• Sypher, Richard (2002). Death of Flight 007. Think Publishing. ISBN 1891098055.
• Takahashi, Akio (1985). Truth Behind KAL Flight 007. Apt Books. ISBN 0865907870.
• Woodson, Frank (2000). The Last Flight of 007 (Take Ten: Disaster). Artesian Press. ISBN 1586590251.

External links

• Shootdown at IMDb
• Tailspin: Behind the Korean Airliner Tragedy at IMDb
• KAL 007 Mystery
• Interview with Soviet pilot who shot down plane
• Pre-shootdown photos of the airplane
• FBI Files for KA007 Mystery: Freedom of Information and Privacy Acts
• Another Location of the FOIA Document of the KAL Flight 007
• KHABAROVSK JOURNAL; Keeping the Air Lanes Free: Lessons of a Horror
• NASA report on autopilot error
• New American article on KAL 007