Iran's president, foreign minister and others found dead at helicopter crash site

TheOneWithTheHair@lemmy.world to News@lemmy.world – 245 points –
Iran's president, foreign minister and others found dead at helicopter crash site
apnews.com
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“One of the main culprits of yesterday’s tragedy is the United States, which ... embargoed the sale of aircraft and aviation parts to Iran and does not allow the people of Iran to enjoy good aviation facilities,” Zarif said. “These will be recorded in the list of US crimes against the Iranian people.”

Of course lol. I wonder how long it took him to find a way to blame it on the US.

"aboard the Bell helicopter, which Iran purchased in the early 2000s"

If Iran was so concerned about the safety, they could have easily used a Russian helicopter which they could get parts and maintain properly. MI-8 are a dime a dozen.

They could have had the best helicopter in the world. They still shouldn't have been flying it in those weather conditions.

No doubt, but Iran can't blame the USA for a helicopter it acquired more than 24 years ago as being the only option for presidential transport.

Maybe they could have spent less on their nuclear weapons programs and more on helicopter programs if they really want working helicopters.

Have they tried not being assholes? That would help things.

Sorry Iran, the US only supports one asshole in the Middle East and it ain't you.

Last time they did that the US installed a brutal dictators. It's been brutal dictators ever since.

It's going to stay that way until everyone has a brutal dictator and they all have a big dick measuring contest and then hopefully that's going to be the end of the two legged apes.

Oh shit. Fucking praying it was a mechanical accident and not an attack from Israel

Yep, looks like it was an accident according to the article, but they still blame the US because of the embargo on aviation parts

Well they stepped into the heli to fly over rough terrain in dense fog and bad weather. Some might call that a little bit tempting fate...

Well they stepped into the heli to fly over rough terrain in dense fog and bad weather. Some might call that a little bit tempting fate...

That can be hazardous in a well-maintained helicopter. Just ask Kobe.

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Why am I not surprised they found a way to blame us for it?

Aren't there lots of folks in the comments crowing about how "the embargo is working" and such? If Americans are taking credit for it then it seems quite reasonable to blame them for it.

I see one such comment, which is in response to Iran blaming the US, and to me reads as a sarcastic retort to a ridiculous claim by Iran

Many people say many things. Uninformed takes from randos on the internet shouldn't be taken seriously and responded to by government officials, regardless of nationality.

If the crash were caused by a mechanical problem, the embargo didn't cause it. It would be much more the fault of the iranian maintance agency who let the helicopter fly despite its issues. If critical parts are unavailable, the safe choice is to ground the helicopter.

We can't be sure until more is known, but this seems much more likely to be controlled flight into terrain. It was foggy in the mountains. Crashes like this do happen even in the US.

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You'd have to be suicidal to fly in deep fog and rain over remote mountains. IFR in extremely bad weather in a helicopter sounds awful. In my country, helicopters are grounded for a lot less. And those are newer helicopters too, afaik.

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I did a deep cleaning of my kitchen yesterday. Mostly because I saw an ant. Nice feeling seeing my kitchen sparkle. How was your weekend?

Wasn't this just a "hard landing" yesterday? Or is this a different event?

Same event. The hard landing was just their initial spin.

We have upgraded this from a “hard landing” to a “gravity assisted flight cancellation procedure.”