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Claiming the Arctic
Buried in the Kremlin
As the region opens up, competition increases for its resources
A number of foreign communists rest in peace with Soviet dignitaries
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TATIANA POSPELOVA
Special Report
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rbth.com
Distributed with
The New York Times Wednesday, November 11, 2015
This special advertising feature is sponsored and produced by Rossiyskaya Gazeta (Russia) and did not involve the reporting or editing staff of The New York Times
NEWS IN BRIEF
Tragedy Posts on social networks tell the stories of the passengers on board the Metrojet plane
Russian and U.S. Forces in Syria Hold Joint Practice
Last Words from Doomed Flight
The Russian and U.S. air forces have held joint drills for crews and ground services as part of an effort to avoid near-misses and collisions in Syria, according to Russian news agency Interfax. “Cooperation with U.S. colleagues is developing successfully as part of interaction with the international anti-terror coalition and the regional countries, aimed at preventing air incidents to ensure safety above Syria,” said Col. Gen. Andrei Kartapolov, the head of the Main Operative Directorate of the Russian Armed Forces General Staff. Kartapolov said that in the exercises, the troops practiced notification, organization and coordination; data-sharing between operative group staff members and the control and command posts of the Russian Air Force at the Hmeimim airbase and the strategic U.S. air operations center in Qatar; and alerting one another about dangerous military activities in the Syrian airspace.
2018 World Cup Director Denies Allegations
AP
REUTERS
The last moments of some of those who died on the flight were captured on social networks, which doesn’t make it any easier for their families to say goodbye. YEKATERINA SINELSCHIKOVA RBTH
Metrojet flight 7K9286, an Airbus A321 traveling from Sharm el-Sheikh was supposed to land at Pulkovo Airport in St. Petersburg at 12:20 p.m. local time on Saturday, Oct. 31. It had 224 people onboard, including 25 children and seven crewmembers.The charter flight from the Egyptian resort was carrying tourists from 13 Russian regions, as well as citizens of Ukraine and Belarus. Their pages on social networks feature photos against the backdrop of the exotic eastern fauna and the sea with such cheerful comments as, “Hurrah! We are flying to warm up,”“Flight delayed, but thoughts are already there” and “I never thought that #egypt would cause so many positive emotions.” By 11 o’ clock on the morning of the crash, the area for greeters at Pulkovo Airport began to fill with the relatives and friends of passengers that were on the flight. Not everyone was immediately aware of what had happened. Those who had heard the news stood aside near the information stands and did not know where to go or what to do. Those that had arrived to greet their relatives and friends were crying and looking with hope at the arrivals board. It initially said that the plane was delayed. Half an hour before the expected landing, the information on the status of the flight disappeared. People kept trying to call their family members, believing to the last minute that the worst could not have happened.
“The chief passenger” Just before departing Egypt, the parents of nine-month-old Darina Gromova took a photo of her as she looked at the runway through the airport’s glass. Her mother Tatiana published the photo of little Darina with the caption“the chief passenger” on social media networks. Later, it became the symbol of the crashed flight with nearly a million people sharing it in memory
of the victims of the tragedy. “None of them knew that this posting would be the last one in their lives,” people have written as they shared the photo. In August 2014, Tatiana had married Darina’s father, Alexei. In their wedding video, they can be seen dancing the waltz, as Alexei’s mother wipes tears from her eyes. “Thanks to my husband for this year, for the daughter, for the care and love!”Tatiana wrote.
“We’re flying home” The large Shein family was also coming home on the flight from Sharm el-Sheikh. They took their last pictures minutes before their departure to St. Petersburg right in the cabin — wife Olga and husband Yury; Zhenya, 11; Valeria, 10; and three-year-old Nastya. “Hi Piter, goodbye Egypt. We’re flying home,”wrote Olga Sheina. The last two weeks of their lives were spent abroad on the family’s first trip out of the country. The couple had marked the anniversary of their marriage on Oct. 27. “27.10.2005. This was the day when we met and fell in love with each other. Then just a few years passed until 27.10.2011. And on this day we got married. Now we are happy together and celebrate our anniversaries,” Olga wrote.
A bad feeling Six months ago, Svetlana Krylova’s older sister, who was an en-
thusiast of palmistry, looked at her hand. She noticed that the life line was less than half of the palm. Svetlana just laughed, as she did not believe that her time would come soon. At the age of 30, she had a very active life and loved to travel. Before leaving for Egypt, she was already planning a trip to China. She was with her husband Mikhail and 10-year-old daughter Kristina on the Metrojet flight. For some unknown reason, 32-year-old Yekaterina Murashova posted a song on her social media account entitled “I Know I Will Not Return”just before getting on the plane. She was the reigning beauty queen of the northwest Russian town of Pskov. The families of the crew members were also mourning loved ones. They had not spent their final days relaxing by the Red Sea, but were simply doing their jobs. “He was looking for himself, trying to find a place for himself on earth, and said he could not live without aviation,”said Anna, the wife of flight attendant Stanislav Sviridov.“He loved the sky.” In addition to his wife, Sviridov is survived by a young daughter and a son. Anna’s voice trembled before the television cameras. During the last weeks before the crash, Stanislav was more timid, soft, as if he forebode his imminent death. “I told him, ‘Write when you get there.’ But he was joking all
the time, ‘You’re a flight attendant, too; why do you need this? If something happens, you’ll see it on the news.’ It seemed that he wanted to be ready not only for life, but for death, too, and constantly watched and studied crashes from all angles,”his wife recalled. But a bad feeling saved another flight attendant. Oleg Yermakov should have been on this flight on Oct. 31. It was his shift. Two weeks before the tragedy, his father had a dream that a crash would happen and his son would die. “Oleg, leave the job,” his father said. A few days before the flight, the flight attendant wrote his letter of resignation. There were several reasons, Yermakov said, but his father’s pressure was among them. He did not mention the dream to anybody else. It is still difficult to be in Pulkovo.The building is unusually quiet and the area in front is covered with flowers and candles. “The number of flowers at the airport and even the postings on Facebook — it really helps [to soothe the pain],” wrote the sister of Anna Tishinskaya, a passenger on the flight, on her Facebook account. But she continues to call her sister. “Every time I understand everything, but I hold my breath and wait for beeps. There are no beeps. The subscriber is not yet available. Like an idiot, I love to believe in the word ‘yet.’”
A flower near debris at the crash site of a Russian airliner in al-Hasanah area in El Arish city, north Egypt, November 1, 2015
Bomb Called Likely Cause of Disaster as Investigation Continues On Nov. 8, Reuters reported that information from the plane’s black boxes indicated to a level of “90 percent certainty” that the Metrojet flight was brought down by a bomb. Four days earlier, Egyptian newspaper Al-Masri al-Yaum, citing “sources in the commission of inquiry” had reported that the transcript from the black boxes showed evidence of an explosion in the engine. Although the flight recorders did not record any emergency calls from the crew to dispatchers, according to the Egyptians they indicate the “presence of a powerful explosion, simultaneous loss of all engine power, a fire in part of the fuselage and the destruction of part of the plane in the air.”
Earlier, officials from the U.S. and the UK indicated that it was likely the plane had been destroyed by a bomb. Last week, the government of the UK halted all flights to Sharm el-Sheik due to concerns that the plane was brought down by a terrorist act. “While the investigation is still ongoing, we cannot say categorically why the Russian jet crashed,” said a statement from British Prime Minister David Cameron’s office. “But as more information has come to light, we have become concerned that the plane may well have been brought down by an explosive device.” On Nov. 6, Russian authorities halted all flights to Egypt until the cause of the crash is determined. ISIS has claimed responsibility for the disas-
ter, but there is no evidence as of yet that the group had the capability to destroy an airliner. Experts from the F.B.I. have now joined the investigation at the request of Russian officials. To establish the exact cause of the disaster, experts will have not only to fully decode the data from the flight recorders, but also collect all the debris to reassemble it in a hangar for careful inspection. The debris from the flight is spread over a remote area of several square miles and the investigation has been hampered by bad weather. Meanwhile, in St. Petersburg, a memorial service for the victims was held Nov. 8 at St. Isaac’s Cathedral.
Alexei Sorokin, general director of Russia’s World Cup 2018 Organizational Committee, has denied statements by FIFA President Joseph“Sepp”Blatter suggesting that Russia had guaranteed itself the right to hold the 2018 soccer World Cup before the vote. “If there were people who made the decision before Dec. 2, fine. But we didn’t know about it. We weren’t aware of the executive committee’s decision,”World Football Insider cites Sorokin as saying. In an interview with Russian news agency Tass, Blatter said that there was “an inner conviction that one championship would be held in Russia. It was decided, although not in writing, I suppose, that the vote would give the championship to the two superpowers: Russia and the U.S.,”Blatter said in an interview with the Financial Times. Blatter also told Tass that he had spoken about holding the World Cup in Russia with President Vladimir Putin.
New Regulations Introduced for Russian Hotels
EVGENY VOLCHKOV / TASS
Under new hotel regulations that went into force Oct. 21, Russian hotels will have to tell clients which services they will have to pay for before their stay, and if a guest checks in at midnight and checks out by noon, they will be charged for only half a day. Youth hostels and children’s camps are exempt from the new rules. Prices for all services along with the hotel owner’s details must to be clearly posted at reception. Additionally, all guests, both Russian and foreign, will need to present their passports at check-in.
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