Russian investigators Sunday ruled out technical faults as a cause of the plane crash that killed Polish President Lech Kaczynski, adding to speculation that pilot error was to blame.
"The recordings that we have confirm that there were no technical problems with the plane," Russia's chief investigator Alexander Bastrykin said in a televised meeting with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
Recordings of the plane's communications with air traffic control revealed the pilot had been warned that thick fog over the airport created precarious landing conditions, but landed anyway, Bastrykin said. "The pilot was informed about complex weather conditions but nevertheless made a decision to land," Bastrykin, the head of Russia's investigative committee, told Putin at their meeting near the site of the crash.
Bastrykin added, however, that evidence from the plane's flight data and voice recorders would be studied in greater detail in Moscow. He also said Polish prosecutors were participating in the probe into the crash, which took place Saturday when Kaczynski's Tu-154 jet was trying to land at the city of Smolensk in western Russia, killing all 96 people aboard.