Malaysia Airlines Flight 17

Information
Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was an incident where the plane was shot down on 17 July 2014 while flying over eastern Ukraine. All 283 passengers and 15 crew were killed.

Background
On Thursday, 17 July 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 departed from Amsterdam Airport Schiphol Gate G3 at 12:13 CEST (10:13 UTC) and took off at 12:31 local time (10:31 UTC). It was due to arrive at Kuala Lumpur International Airport at 06:10 MYT, Friday, 18 July (22:10 UTC, 17 July).

According to the original flight plan, MH17 was to fly over Ukraine at flight level 330 (33,000 feet or 10,060 metres) and then change to FL 350 around the Ukrainian city of Dnipropetrovsk. When it reached the area as planned, at 15:53 local time (12:53 UTC), Dnipropetrovsk Air Control (Dnipro Control) asked MH17 if they could climb to FL 350 as planned, and also to avoid a potential separation conflict with another flight, Singapore Airlines Flight 351 (SQ351), also at FL 330. The crew asked to remain at FL 330 and the air traffic controller approved this request, moving the other flight to FL 350. At 16:00 local time (13:00 UTC), the crew asked for a deviation of 20 nautical miles (37 km) to the left (north) off course, on airway L980, due to weather conditions. This request was also approved by Dnipro Control ATC. The crew then asked if they could climb to FL 340, which was rejected as this flight level was not available, so MH17 remained at FL 330. At 16:19 local time (13:19 UTC), Dnipro Control noticed that the flight was 3.6 nautical miles (6.7 km) north of the centreline of approved airway and instructed MH17 to return to the track. At 16:19 local time (13:19 UTC), Dnipro Control contacted Russian ATC in Rostov-on-Don (RND Control) by telephone and requested clearance to transfer the flight to Russian airspace. After obtaining the permission, Dnipro Control attempted to contact MH17 for handing them off to RND Control at 16:20 local time (13:20 UTC), but the aircraft did not respond. When MH17 did not respond to several calls, Dnipro Control contacted RND Control again to check if they could see the aircraft on their radar. RND Control confirmed that the airplane had disappeared.

The Dutch Safety Board reported a last flight data recording at 16:20 local time (13:20 UTC), located west of the urban-type settlement Rozsypne (Розсипне), near Hrabove heading east-southeast (ESE, 115°) at 494 knots (915 km/h; 568 mph).

At exactly 16:20:03 local time (13:20:03 UTC) a Buk ground-to-air missile, which had been launched from an area east from the aircraft, detonated outside the aircraft just above the cockpit to the left. An explosive decompression occurred, resulting in both the cockpit and tail sections tearing away from the middle portion of the fuselage. All three sections disintegrated as they fell rapidly towards the ground.

Most of the debris landed near Hrabove, a village located north of Torez in eastern Ukraine's Donetsk Oblast, it spread over a 50 square kilometres (19 sq mi) area to the southwest of Hrabove.[7]:53 The fireball on impact is believed to have been captured on video. Photographs from the site of the crash show scattered pieces of broken fuselage and engine parts, bodies, and passports. Some of the wreckage fell close to houses.[77] Dozens of bodies fell into crop fields, and some fell into houses.

Three other commercial aircraft were in the same area when the Malaysian airplane crashed: Air India Flight 113 (AI113), a Boeing 787 en route from Delhi to Birmingham, EVA Air Flight 88 (BR88), a Boeing 777 en route from Paris to Taipei, and the closest aircraft Singapore Airlines Flight 351 (SQ351) was 33 kilometres (21 mi) away, a Boeing 777 en route from Copenhagen to Singapore.