The plane carrying Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, who was killed in a crash in Russia, showed no sign of problem until a precipitous drop in its final 30 seconds, as reported by news agency Reuters. According to Russian media, while the Wagner chief was on the list of passengers on board the flight, it could not be determined if he was among the dead.
According to Russia's emergency situations ministry, Rosaviatsia, Russia's aviation agency, said that an Embraer (EMBR3.SA) Legacy 600 executive jet was travelling from Moscow to St. Petersburg when it crashed near the village of Kuzhenkino in the Tver Region, as per Reuters.
The last position of the aircraft recorded before the crash by online flight tracker Flightradar24 was at 3:11 p.m. GMT. According to Reuters, jamming or interference in the area probably slowed the collection of further location data. Ian Petchenik of Flightradar24 said that at 3:19 p.m. GMT, the aircraft made a "sudden downward vertical. The plane had plummeted more than 8,000 feet from its cruising altitude of 28,000 feet within about 30 seconds. "Whatever happened, happened quickly," Petchenik said.
"They may have been wrestling (with the aircraft) after whatever happened," Petchenik said, as quoted by Reuters. There was "no indication that there was anything wrong with this aircraft" prior to its drop. In a video, the plane can be seen descending rapidly with its nose pointing almost straight downward and a plume of smoke or vapour behind it, as per Reuters.
Notably, Prigozhin had a raised a flag of rebellion against Russian President Vladimir Putin and ventured to Moscow with his band of armed loyalists a few months back. However, his attempted rebellion was cut short after a deal was reached with Kremlin. As part of the deal that Kremlin brokered with the mercenary and private military operator, Prigozhin was to dial down his rhetoric against President Putin and go into exile in Belarus.
Prigozhin, a 61-year-old former convict, had denied having any connections with the military group Wagner until September last year when he announced he was “proud” to be its founder, as per a report by Independent.
Prigozhin was popularly known as “Putin’s chef” as his catering business earlier hosted dinners for the Russian president and fed the Kremlin’s armed forces.
According to reports, the Wagner chief rose to being the top military operator in the world due to his alleged closeness to the President Vladimir Putin and his company was involved in the annexation of Crimea from Ukraine. After raising the spectre of a mutiny, the Wagner boss later issued a statement claiming that his revolt was not so much against Putin as it was against members of Russia’s ruling elite.