Korean Air Lines Flight 007 (KAL 007, KE 007) was a Korean Air Lines civilian airliner that was shot down by Soviet jet interceptors on September 1, 1983, over the Sea of Japan, just west of Sakhalin island over prohibited Soviet airspace. All 269 passengers and crew aboard were killed, including Lawrence McDonald, a sitting member of the United States Congress. The aircraft was en route from New York City via Anchorage to Seoul when it strayed into prohibited Soviet airspace because of a navigational error.

The Soviet Union initially denied knowledge of the incident, but later admitted shooting the aircraft down, claiming that it was on a spy mission. The Politburo said it was a deliberate provocation by the United States, to test the Soviet Union's military preparedness, or even to provoke a war. The United States accused the Soviet Union of obstructing search and rescue operations. Furthermore, the Soviet military suppressed evidence sought by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) investigation, notably the flight data recorders, which were eventually released nine years later after a change of government.

The incident was one of the most tense moments of the Cold War, and resulted in an escalation of anti-Soviet sentiment, particularly in the United States. The opposing points of view on the incident were never fully resolved; consequently, several groups continue to dispute official reports and offer alternate theories of the event. The subsequent release of transcripts and flight recorders by the Russian Federation has addressed some details.

As a result of the incident, the United States altered tracking procedures for aircraft departing Alaska, while the interface of the autopilot used on airliners was redesigned to make it more failsafe. President Ronald Reagan ordered the U.S. military to make the Global Positioning System (GPS) available for civilian use so that navigational errors like that of KAL 007 could be averted in the future.

Details of the flight

Korean Air Lines Flight 007 was a commercial Boeing 747-230B(Serial Number CN20559/186, registration: HL7442, formerly D-ABYH operated by Condor Airlines) built in 1971 flying from New York City, United States to Seoul, South Korea. The aircraft departed Gate 15, 35 minutes behind its scheduled departure time of 23:50 EDT on August 30, 1983 (0350 UTC, August 31). Carrying 246 passengers and 23 crew members, the aircraft took off from John F. Kennedy International Airport. After refueling at Anchorage International Airport in Anchorage, Alaska, the aircraft, piloted on this leg of the journey by Captain Chun Byung-in, departed for Seoul at 1300 UTC (4:00 AM Alaska Time) on August 31, 1983.

The nationalities of the passengers were as follows:

Nationality	Victims
	105*
	62
	28
	23
	16
	12
	8
	5
	2
	2
	1
	1
	1
	1
	1
	1
Total	269

The aircrew had an unusually high ratio of crew to passengers. Twelve passengers occupied the upper deck first class, while in business almost all of 24 seats were taken; in economy class, approximately 80 seats did not contain passengers. There were 22 children under the age of 12 aboard. U.S. congressman Lawrence McDonald from Georgia, who at the time was also the second president of the conservative John Birch Society, was on the flight. One hundred thirty passengers planned to connect to other destinations such as Tokyo, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina, Senator Steven Symms of Idaho, and Representative Carroll J. Hubbard, Jr. of Kentucky were aboard sister flight KAL 015, which flew 15 minutes behind KAL 007; they were headed to Seoul, Korea in order to attend the ceremonies for the 30 year anniversary of the U.S.-Korea Mutual Defense Treaty.

Flight deviation from assigned route

After taking off from Anchorage, the flight was instructed by ATC to turn to a heading of 220 degrees. Approximately 90 seconds later, ATC directed the flight to "proceed direct Bethel when able." Upon arriving over Bethel, flight 007 would enter the northernmost of five wide airways, known as the NOPAC (North Pacific) routes, that bridge the Alaskan and Japanese coasts. KAL 007's particular airway, R-20 (Romeo 20), passes just from Soviet airspace off the Kamchatka coast.

The auto pilot system had four basic control modes: INS, HEADING, VOR/LOC and ILS. When the INS navigation systems were properly programmed with the filed flight plan waypoints, the pilot could turn the auto pilot mode selector switch to the INS position and the plane would then automatically track the programmed INS course line, provided it was headed in the proper direction and within 7.5 nautical miles of the INS course line. The HEADING mode of the autopilot would normally be engaged sometime after takeoff to comply with vectors from ATC, and then after receiving appropriate ATC clearance, to guide the plane to a position within the required 7.5 miles, so that the INS mode could then be engaged.

The Anchorage VOR beacon was not operational because of maintenance. The crew received a NOTAM (Notice to Airmen) of this fact, which was not seen as a problem as the captain could still check his position at the next VORTAC beacon at Bethel, away. However the aircraft was required to maintain the assigned heading of 220 degrees, until it could receive the signals from Bethel, then it could fly direct to Bethel, as instructed by ATC, by centering the VOR "to" course deviation indicator (CDI) and then engaging the auto pilot in the VOR/LOC mode. Then, when over the Bethel beacon, the flight could start using INS mode to follow the waypoints comprising route Romeo-20 around the coast of the U.S.S.R. to Seoul.

At about 10 minutes after take-off, KAL 007, flying on a heading of 245 degrees, began to deviate to the right (north) of its assigned route to Bethel; it would continue to fly on this constant heading for the next five and a half hours.

International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) simulation and analysis of the flight data recorder determined that this deviation was probably caused by the aircraft's auto pilot system operating in HEADING mode, after the point that it should have been switched to the INS mode. According to the ICAO, the autopilot was not operating in the INS mode for one of two reasons. Either the crew did not switch the autopilot to the INS mode (shortly after Cairn Mountain) or they did select the INS mode, but it did not activate as the aircraft had already deviated off track by more than the tolerance permitted by the inertial navigation computer. In both scenarios, the autopilot remained in the HEADING mode, and the problem was not detected by the crew.

At 28 minutes after take-off, civilian radar at Kenai, on the eastern shore of Cook Inlet and with radar coverage west of Anchorage, tracked KAL 007 north of where it should have been.

When KAL 007 did not reach Bethel at 50 minutes after takeoff, military radar at King Salmon, Alaska, tracked KAL 007 at north of where it should have been. However, there is no evidence to indicate that civil air traffic controllers or military radar personnel at Elmendorf Air Force Base (who were in a position to receive the King Salmon radar output) were aware of KAL 007's deviation in real-time, and therefore able to warn the aircraft. It had exceeded its permissible leeway of deviation sixfold, of error being the maximum expected drift from course if the inertial navigation system was activated.

KAL 007's divergence prevented the aircraft from transmitting its position via shorter range very high frequency radio (VHF). It therefore requested KAL 015, also en route to Seoul, to relay reports to air traffic control on its behalf. KAL 007 requested KAL 015 to relay its position three times in total. At 1443 UTC, KAL 007 directly transmitted a change of estimated time of arrival for its next waypoint, NEEVA, to the international flight service station at Anchorage, but it did so over the longer range high frequency radio (HF) rather than VHF. HF transmissions are able to carry a longer distance than VHF, but are vulnerable to interference and static; VHF are clearer with less interference, and preferred by flight crews. The inability to establish direct radio communications to be able to transmit their position directly did not alert the pilots of KAL 007 of their ever increasing divergence and was not considered unusual by air traffic controllers. Halfway between Bethel and waypoint NABIE, KAL 007 passed through the southern portion of the North American Air Defense buffer zone. This zone, monitored intensively by National Security Agency assets, is north of Romeo 20 and off-limits to civilian aircraft.

KAL 007 continued its journey, ever increasing its deviation— off course at waypoint NABIE, off course at waypoint NUKKS, and off course at waypoint NEEVA—until it reached the Kamchatka Peninsula.

Airway R20 Waypoint	Co-ordinates	ATC	KAL 007 Deviation
CAIRN MOUNTAIN		Anchorage
BETHEL		Anchorage
NABIE		Anchorage
NUKKS		Anchorage
NEEVA		Anchorage
NINNO		Anchorage
NIPPI		Anchorage/Tokyo
NYTIM		Tokyo	to point of impact
NOKKA		Tokyo	to point of impact
NOHO		Tokyo	to point of impact

Flight crew awareness of deviation

The reasons put forward for the aircraft's deviation range from a lack of situational awareness by the pilots (ICAO), to a planned and intentional deviation (Pearson), to an INS programming error by 10 degrees of longitude, during the inserting of the ramp starting position, by the Flight Engineer (Hersh pp. 199-213, the "Harold Ewing scenario," which ICAO studied in great detail). All accounts note that the pilots had several sources of information that could have alerted them to their increasing deviation from their planned route. The H/E scenario additionally suggests the FO did know they were flying away from the planned course, but the airline's culture discouraged anyone from questioning the Captain's conduct of the flight, so he remained silent.

The horizontal situation indicator (HSI): The HSI’s needle should have alerted the pilots of their course deviation. The needle of each pilot's HSI, capable of showing deviation only up to , should have been “pegged” all the way to the side. The pilots, thus, could have known that they were at least off course.

Despite this, at 1349 UTC, the pilots were reporting that they were on course ("007, Bethel at forty niner.") Fifty minutes after takeoff, military radar at King Salmon, Alaska acquired KAL 007 at more than off course. The deviation exceeded the expected accuracy of the INS ( an hour) by a factor of six.

Difficulties in making required reports: Pilot and copilot could also have been aware of the aircraft’s serious deviation because now, much more than off course, KAL 007 was too far off course for the pilots to make their required Very High Frequency (VHF) radio reports, and had to relay these reports via KAL Flight 015, just minutes behind and on course (KAL 007, increasingly off course, relied on KAL 015 three times to relay its reports to Anchorage Air Traffic Control). By being forced to rely on KAL 015 to relay messages, KAL 007 should have (by definition) understood that they were well off course.

At one point in this section of its flight, (1443 UTC) KAL 007 put a call through a navigational "hookup", the International Flight Service Station on HF. Flight 007, now too distant to speak directly with Anchorage controller through VHF, was transmitting its message indirectly using HF. At another point of this section of the flight, at waypoint NABIE, KAL 007 was too far north to make radar contact with the VHF air traffic control relay station on St Paul's Island. KAL 015 relayed for KAL 007. The message was a change in the estimated time of arrival (ETA) for the next waypoint called NEEVA, delaying by four minutes the ETA that KAL 015 had previously relayed on behalf of KAL 007. Since a revised ETA could only be calculated by means of readout information presented by KAL 007’s Inertial Navigation Systems Control Display unit, pilot and copilot were once again presented with the opportunity of verifying their position and becoming aware of their enormous deviation.

Contrary wind conditions of KAL 007 and KAL 015: When KAL 007 passed out of Kamchatka air space and was a few minutes into international air space over the Sea of Okhutsk, it was heading in the direction of Terpenie Bay on the West shore of Sakhalin Island. At the same minute (1805 UTC) that Maj. Osipovich in his Su-15 interceptor fell in behind KAL 007 and reports to his ground controller "am observing", KAL 007, off course, and KAL 015, on course many miles away, and about 15 minutes beind KAL 007, compare wind velocity and direction. KAL 015 is encountering tailwinds while KAL 007 is encountering headwinds.KAL 015: "Um Um We are now having an unexpected strong tailwind How much do you get there? How much and which direction?" KAL 007: "206. Ask him how many knots?..." KAL 007: "Ah! You got so much! We still got headwind. Headwind 215 degrees, 15 knots." KAL 015: "Is it so? But according to flight plan wind direction 360, 15 knots approximately." KAL 007: "Well, it may be like this." Capt. Chun, by accepting these irreconcilables, has lost his last chance to escape.

Weather radar: There was one last navigational aid to warn the crew. With consoles at the knees of both pilot and copilot, the plane’s weather radar could have alerted them, both over Kamchatka and later over Sakhalin, to the fact that they were no longer flying over water, as they ought to have been. Weather radar has two modes—land mapping for clear weather (when it would be possible to look down and see water or land masses as well as the contours of the coast lines) and weather surveillance mode for cloudy weather, when it is necessary to "see through" clouds in order to detect dangerous thunderstorms.. In land mapping mode, KAL 007 had only to make sure that the land mass of Kamchatka and the island string of the Kurile chain would remain to the right. That night, however, KAL 007’s weather radar was probably not in land mapping mode, for the weather was inclement.The ICAO's meteorological analysis concluded that "there was extensive coverage of low, medium, and high level clouds over southern Kamchatka associated with an active cold front."” ICAO’s analysis of KAL 007’s weather radar functioning would state, "it was concluded that the radar was not functioning properly or that the ground mapping capability was not used."”

According to the ICAO, an indicator of pilot unawareness of the deviation from route of their flight was the bantering and casual cockpit conversation at the times that awareness of deviation into hostile airspace would have increased tension and have precluded this. (See transcript section)

Shootdown

(For transcripts of interception, attack, and post attack flight of KAL 007, see "Flight Timeline and Transcripts" click-on section below]

In 1983, Cold War tensions had escalated because of several factors. These included the United States's Strategic Defense Initiative, its planned deployment of Pershing II missiles in Europe in March and April, and FleetEx '83, the largest fleet exercise held to date in the North Pacific. Aircraft from and repeatedly overflew Soviet military installations in the Kurile Islands during FleetEx '83, resulting in the dismissal or reprimanding of Soviet military officials who had been unable to shoot them down. On the Soviet side, Operation RYAN was expanded. Lastly, there was a heightened alert around the Kamchatka Peninsula when KAL 007 was in the vicinity, because of a Soviet missile test that was scheduled for the same day. The missile test was the reason that a United States Air Force RC-135 reconnaissance aircraft was patrolling off the peninsula.

When KAL 007 was about from the Kamchatka coast, four MiG-23 fighters were scrambled to intercept the fast and high-flying Boeing 747. At 1551 UTC, according to Soviet sources, KAL 007 entered the restricted airspace of Kamchatka Peninsula. The buffer zone extended from Kamchatka's coast and is known as a Flight Information Region (FIR). The radius of the buffer zone nearest to Soviet territory had the additional designation of prohibited airspace. Significant command and control problems were experienced trying to vector the military jets onto the Boeing before they ran out of fuel. In addition, pursuit was made more difficult, according to Soviet Air Force Captain Alexander Zuyev, who defected to the West in 1989, because Arctic gales had knocked out Soviet radar ten days before. The unidentified jetliner therefore crossed over the Kamchatka Peninsula back into international airspace over the Sea of Okhotsk without being intercepted.

The Commander of the Soviet Far East District Air Defense Forces, General Valeri Kamensky, was adamant that KAL 007 was to be destroyed even over neutral waters but only after positive identification showed it not to be a passenger plane. His subordinate, General Anatoli Kornukov, commander of Sokol Air base (later to become commander of the Russian Air Force), was adamant that there was no need to make positive identification as "the intruder" had already flown over Kamchatka.

General Kornukov (to Military District Headquarters-Gen. Kamenski): (5:47)

"...simply destroy [it] even if it is over neutral waters? Are the orders to destroy it over neutral waters? Oh, well."

Kamenski:

We must find out, maybe it is some civilian craft or God knows who."

Kornukov:

"What civilian? [It] has flown over Kamchatka! It [came] from the ocean without identification. I am giving the order to attack if it crosses the State border."

Soviet Air Defence Force units that had been tracking the Korean aircraft for more than an hour while it entered and left Soviet airspace now classified the aircraft as a military target when it re-entered their airspace over Sakhalin Island. After a protracted ground-controlled interception, three Su-15 Flagon fighters from nearby Dolinsk-Sokol airbase and a MiG-23 from Smirnykh Air Base managed to make visual contact with the Boeing. The pilot of the lead Su-15 fighter fired warning shots, but recalled later in 1991:

At this point, KAL 007 contacted Tokyo air traffic control requesting clearance to ascend to a higher flight level for reasons of fuel economy; the request was granted, so the Boeing started to climb, gradually slowing as it exchanged speed for altitude. The decrease in speed caused the pursuing fighter to overshoot the Boeing, an action that was interpreted by the Soviet pilot as an evasive maneuver. The order to shoot KAL 007 down was given as it was about to leave Soviet airspace for the second time. At around 1826 UTC, under pressure from General Anatoly Kornukov, Commander of Sokol Air Bases on Sakhalin, and ground controllers not to let the aircraft escape into international airspace, the lead fighter was able to move back into a position where it could fire two Kaliningrad K-8 air-to-air missiles at the plane.

Soviet pilot's recollection of shootdown

In a 1991 interview with Izvestia, Major Gennadi Osipovich, pilot of the Su-15 interceptor that shot the 747 down, spoke about his recollections of the events leading up to the shootdown. He recalled telling ground controllers that, contrary to official Soviet statements at the time, there were blinking lights, which he believed should have alerted them to the fact that the plane was a civilian transport. He also stated that he knew it was a civilian Boeing from the double rows of windows: "I saw two rows of windows and knew that this was a Boeing. I knew this was a civilian plane. But for me this meant nothing. It is easy to turn a civilian type of plane into one for military use..." Osipovich also stated that, in the pressure of the moment, he did not provide a full description of the intruder to Soviet ground controllers: "I did not tell the ground that it was a Boeing-type plane," he recalled, "They did not ask me."

This omission of the identity of KAL 007 as a Boeing by Osipovich is evident in the communications subsequently released by the Russian Federation with the combat controller, Lt. Col. Titovnin (see Flight timeline and transcripts).

Commenting on the moment that KAL 007 slowed as it ascended from flight level 330 to flight level 350, and then on his maneuvering for missile launch, Osipovich said:

"They [KAL 007] quickly lowered their speed. They were flying at 400 kilometers per hour. My speed was more than 400. I was simply unable to fly slower. In my opinion, the intruder's intentions were plain. If I did not want to go into a stall, I would be forced to overshoot them. That's exactly what happened. We had already flown over the island [Sakhalin]. It is narrow at that point, the target was about to get away… Then the ground [controller] gave the command: 'Destroy the target…!' That was easy to say. But how? With shells‽ I had already expended 243 rounds. Ram it? I had always thought of that as poor taste. Ramming is the last resort. Just in case, I had already completed my turn and was coming down on top of him. Then, I had an idea. I dropped below him about 2,000 meters… afterburners. Switched on the missiles and brought the nose up sharply. Success! I have a lock on."

"We shot down the plane legally... Later we began to lie about small details: the plane was supposedly flying without running lights or strobe light, that tracer bullets were fired, or that I had radio contact with them on the emergency frequency of 121.5 megahertz."

Post-attack flight

At the time of the attack, the plane had been cruising at an altitude of about . Tapes recovered from the airliner's cockpit voice recorder indicate that the crew were unaware that they were off course and violating Soviet airspace. Immediately after missile detonation, the airliner began a 113-second arc upward because of a damaged cross-over cable between the left inboard and right outboard elevators. At 1826:46 UTC, at the apex of the arc at altitude , either the pilot was able to turn off the autopilot or the autopilot tripped and the plane began to descend to . From 1827:01 until 1827:09, the flight crew reports to Tokyo Radio informing that KAL 007 to "descend to 10,000" [feet]. At 1827:20, ICAO graphing of Digital Flight Data Recorder tapes show that after a descent phase and a 10 second "nose-up", KAL 007 is now leveled out at pre-missile detonation altitude of 35,000 ft., forward acceleration is now back to pre-missile detonation rate of zero acceleration, and air speed has returned to pre-detonation velocity. Yaw (oscillations), begun at the time of missile detonation, continue decreasingly until the end of the minute 44 second portion of the tape. The Boeing did not break up, explode or plummet immediately after the attack; it continued its gradual descent for four minutes, then leveled off at 16,424 feet (1830–1831 UTC), rather than continue descending to 10,000 as previously reported to Tokyo Radio, continuing at this altitude for almost five more minutes (1835 UTC). The last cockpit voice recorder entry occurred at 1827:46 while in this phase of the descent. At 1828 UTC, the aircraft was reported turning to the north. ICAO analysis concluded that the flight crew "retained limited control" of the aircraft. Finally, the aircraft began to descend in spirals over Moneron Island before coming down , killing all 269 on board. The aircraft was last seen visually by Osipovich, "somehow descending slowly" over Moneron Island. The aircraft disappeared off long range military radar at Wakkanai, Japan at a height of .

KAL 007 was probably attacked in international airspace, with a 1993 Russian report listing the location of the missile firing outside its territory at , although the intercepting pilot stated otherwise in a subsequent interview. Initial reports that the airliner had been forced to land on Sakhalin were soon proved false. One of these reports conveyed via phone by Orville Brockman, the Washington office spokesman of the Federal Aviation Administration to the press secretary of Larry McDonald was that the FAA in Tokyo had been informed by the Japanese Civil Aviation Bureau that "Japanese self-defense radar force confirms that the Hokkaido radar followed Air Korea to a landing in Soviet territory on the island of Sakhalinska S-a-k-h-a-l-i-n-s-k-a and it is confirmed by the manifest that Congressman McDonald is on board"

A Japanese fisherman aboard the 58th Chidori Maru later reported to the Japanese Maritime Safety Agency of hearing a plane at low altitude but did not see it. Then he heard "a loud sound followed by a bright flash of light on the horizon, then another dull sound and a less intense flash of light on the horizon" as well as smelling aviation fuel.

Missile damage to plane

The following damage to the aircraft was determined by the ICAO from its analysis of the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder:

• The Hydraulics: KAL 007 had four redundant hydraulic systems of which systems one, two, and three were damaged or destroyed. There was no evidence of damage to system four. The hydraulics provided actuation for all the primary flight controls; all secondary flight controls (except leading edge Krueger flaps); and landing gear retraction, extension, gear steering, and wheel braking. Each primary flight control axis received power from all four hydraulic systems. Upon missile detonation, the jumbo jet began to experience oscillations (yawing) as the dual channel yaw damper was damaged. Yawing would not have occurred if hydraulic systems one or two were fully operational. The result is that the control column does not thrust forward upon impact (it should have done so as the plane was on autopilot) to bring down the plane to its former altitude of 35,000 feet. This failure of the autopilot to correct the rise in altitude indicates that hydraulic system number three, which operates the autopilot actuator, a system controlling the plane's elevators, was damaged or out. KAL 007's airspeed and acceleration rate both began to decrease as the plane began to climb. At twenty seconds after missile detonation a click was heard in the cabin, which is identified as the "automatic pilot disconnect warning" sound. Either the pilot or co-pilot had disconnected the autopilot and was manually thrusting the control column forward in order to bring the plane lower. Though the autopilot had been turned off, manual mode did not begin functioning for another twenty seconds. This failure of the manual system to engage upon command indicates failure in hydraulic systems one and two. With wing flaps up, "control was reduced to the right inboard aileron and the innermost of spoiler section of each side."
• Left Wing: Contrary to Major Osipovich's statement in 1991 that he had taken off half of KAL 007's left wing, ICAO analysis found that the wing was intact: "The interceptor pilot stated that the first missile hit near the tail, while the second missile took off half the left wing of the aircraft... The interceptor's pilot's statement that the second missile took off half of the left wing was probably incorrect. The missiles were fired with a two-second interval and would have detonated at an equal interval. The first detonated at 1826:02 UTC. The last radio transmissions from KE007 to Tokyo Radio were between 1826:57 and 1827:15 UTC using HF [high frequency]. The HF 1 radio aerial of the aircraft was positioned in the left wing tip suggesting that the left wing tip was intact at this time. Also, the aircraft's maneuvers after the attack did not indicate extensive damage to the left wing."
• Engines: The co-pilot reported to Captain Chun twice during the flight after the missile's detonation, "Engines normal, sir."
• Tail Section: The first missile was radar-controlled and proximity-fused, and detonated behind the aircraft. Sending fragments forward, it either severed or unraveled the crossover cable from the left inboard elevator to the right elevator. This, with damage to one of the four hydraulic systems, caused KAL 007 to ascend from to , at which point the autopilot was disengaged.
• Fuselage: Tiny shrapnel from the proximity-fused air-to-air missile that detonated behind the aircraft, punctured the fuselage and caused rapid decompression of the pressurised cabin. The interval of 11 seconds between the sound of missile detonation picked up by the cockpit voice recorder and the sound of the alarm sounding in the cockpit enabled ICAO analysts to determine that the total size of the tiny ruptures to the pressurized fuselage was .)

Search and rescue

As a result of Cold War tensions, the search and rescue operations of the Soviet Union were not co-ordinated with those of the United States, South Korea, and Japan. Consequently no information was shared, and each side endeavoured to harass or obtain evidence to implicate the other. The flight data recorders were the key pieces of evidence sought by both factions, with the United States insisting that an independent observer from the ICAO be present on one of its search vessels in the event that they were found. International boundaries are not well defined on the open sea, leading to numerous confrontations between the large number of opposing naval ships that were assembled in the area.

Soviet search and rescue mission to Moneron Island

The Soviets did not acknowledge shooting down the aircraft until 6 September. Eight days after the shootdown, Marshal of the Soviet Union and Chief of General Staff Nikolai Ogarkov denied knowledge of where KAL 007 had gone down, "We could not give the precise answer about the spot where it [KAL 007] fell because we ourselves did not know the spot in the first place." But nine years after, the Russian Federation handed over transcripts of Soviet military communications that showed that at least two documented search and rescue (SAR) missions were ordered within a half hour of the attack to the last Soviet verified location of the descending jumbo jet, over Moneron Island: The first search was ordered from Smirnykh Air Base in central Sakhalin at 18:47 GMT, 9 minutes after KAL 007 had disappeared from Soviet radar screens, and brought rescue helicopters from Khomutovo Air base, the civilian and military airport at Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk City in southern Sakhalin, and KGB boats to the area. The second search was ordered 8 minutes later by the Deputy Commander of the Far Eastern Military District, Gen. Strogov, and involved civilian trawlers that were in the area around Moneron. "The border guards. What ships do we now have near Moneron Island, if they are civilians, send [them] there immediately." Moneron is just long and wide, located due west of Sakhalin Island at ; it is the only land mass in the whole Tatar Straits.

Human remains and artifacts

Surface finds

Passengers' footwear retrieved by Soviets from the crash site

No body parts were recovered by the Russians from the surface of the sea in their own territorial waters, though they would later turn over clothes and shoes to a joint U.S.–Japanese delegation to Nevelsk on Sakhalin. On Monday, September 26, 1983, a delegation of seven Japanese and American officials arriving aboard the Japanese patrol boat Tsugaru, had met a six-man Soviet delegation at the port of Nevelsk on Sakhalin Island. KGB Major General A. I. Romanenko, the Commander of the Sakhalin and Kuril Islands frontier guard, headed the Soviet delegation. Romanenko handed over to the Americans and Japanese, among other things, single and paired footwear. With footwear that the Japanese also retrieved, the total came to 213 men's, women's and children's dress shoes, sandals, and sports shoes. The Soviets said that all that they had retrieved, they had found floating in the water or washed up on the shores of Sakhalin and Moneron islands. Family members of KAL 007 passengers would later state that these shoes were actually worn by their loved ones for the flight. Sonia Munder had no difficulty recognizing the sneakers of her children, one of Christian age 14 and one of Lisi age 17, by the intricate way her children laced them. Another mother says, "I recognized them just like that. You see, there are all kinds of inconspicuous marks which strangers do not notice. This is how I recognized them. My daughter loved to wear them." And yet another mother, Nan Oldham, identified her John's sneakers from a photo in Life magazine of 55 of the 213 shoes -- apparently, a random array on display those first days at Chitose Air Force Base in Japan. "We saw photos of his shoes in a magazine," says Nan, "We followed up through KAL and a few weeks later, a package arrived. His shoes were inside: size 11 sneakers with cream white paint." John Oldham had taken his seat in row 31 of KAL 007 wearing those cream white paint spattered sneakers. He had boarded after coming from painting his suburban Washington, D.C., family home.

Nothing was found by the joint U.S.–Japanese–South Korean search and rescue/salvage operations in international waters at the designated crash site or within the search area.

Hokkaido finds

Eight days after the shootdown, human remains appeared on the north shore of Hokkaido, Japan. Hokkaido is located about below the southern tip of Sakhalin across the Soya Strait (the southern tip of Sakhalin is from Moneron Island which lies to the west of Sakhalin). The ICAO concluded that these objects were carried from Russian waters to the Japanese shores of Hokkaido by the southerly current west of Sakhalin Island. All currents of the Tsushima Strait relevant to Moneron Island flow to the north, except this southerly current between Moneron Island and Sakhalin Island. These human remains, including body parts, tissues, and two partial torsos, totaled 13 in number. All were unidentifiable, but one partial torso was that of a Caucasian woman as indicated by auburn hair on a partial skull, and one partial body was of an Asian child (with glass imbedded). There was no luggage recovered. Of the non human remains that the Japanese recovered were various items including dentures, newspapers, seats, books, 8 KAL paper cups, shoes, sandals, and sneakers, a camera case, a "please fasten seat belt" sign, an oxygen mask, a handbag, a bottle of dish washing fluid, several blouses, an identity card belonging to 25 year old passenger Mary Jane Hendrie of Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, Canada, and the business card of passenger Kathy Brown-Spier. All of these items generally come from the passenger cabin of an aircraft. There were none of the items found that generally come from the cargo hold of a plane, such as suitcases, packing boxes, industrial machinery, instruments and sports equipment.

Soviet diver reports

In 1991, Russian newspaper Izvestia published a series of interviews with Soviet military personnel who had been involved in salvage operations to find and recover parts of the aircraft. After three days of searching using trawlers, side-scan sonar, and diving bells, the aircraft wreckage was located by Russian searchers at a depth of near Moneron Island. Since no human remains or luggage were found on the surface in the impact area, the divers expected to find the remains of passengers who had been trapped in the submerged wreckage of the aircraft on the seabed. However when they visited the site two weeks after the shootdown, they found that the wreckage was in small pieces and no bodies:

"I had the idea that it would be intact.

Well, perhaps a little banged up...

The divers would go inside the aircraft and see everything there was to see.

In fact it was completely demolished, scattered about like kindling.

The largest things we saw were the braces which are especially strong—they were about one and a half or two meters long and 50–60 centimeters wide.

As for the rest—broken into tiny pieces..."

According to Izvestia, the divers had only 10 encounters with passenger remains (tissues and body parts) in the debris area, including one partial torso.

Tinro ll submersible Captain Mikhail Igorevich Girs' diary: Submergence 10 October. Aircraft pieces, wing spars, pieces of aircraft skin, wiring, and clothing. But—no people. The impression is that all of this has been dragged here by a trawl rather than falling down from the sky…’

Viyacheslav Popov: "I will confess that we felt great relief when we found out that there were no bodies at the bottom. Not only no bodies; there were also no suitcases or large bags. I did not miss a single dive. I have quite a clear impression: The aircraft was filled with garbage, but there were really no people there. Why? Usually when an aircraft crashes, even a small one... As a rule there are suitcases and bags, or at least the handles of the suitcases."

A number of civilian divers, whose first dive was on Sept. 15, two weeks after the shootdown, state that Soviet military divers and trawls had been at work before them:

Diver Viyacheslav Popov: "As we learned then, before us the trawlers had done some ‘work’ in the designated quadrant. It is hard to understand what sense the military saw in the trawling operation. First drag everything haphazardly around the bottom by the trawls, and then send in the submersibles?...It is clear that things should have been done in the reverse order.”

ICAO also interviewed a number of these divers for its 1993 report: "In addition to the scraps of metal, they observed personal effects, such as clothing, documents and wallets. Although some evidence of human remains was noticed by the divers, they found no bodies."

Search for KAL 007 in international waters

The fleet tug and the Soviet cruiser Petropavlovsk during salvage operations

The Soviet Ivan Susanin class patrol icebreaker Imeni XXV sezda KPSS with a Ka-25 Hormone helicopter on the helicopter pad shadows salvage operations for downed Korean Air Lines Flight 007

From early in September until the beginning of November, the U.S. with the Japanese and South Koreans carried out joint search and rescue and then salvage operations. Rear Admiral Walter T. Piotti Jr, commander of Task Force 71 of 7th Fleet would summarize the U.S. and alllied and then the Soviets’ Search and Salvage operations:

“Not since the search for the hydrogen bomb lost off Palomares, Spain has the U.S. Navy undertaken a search effort ofthe magnitude or import of the search for the wreckage of KAL Flight 007.”

“Within six days of the downing of KAL 007, the Soviets had deployed six ships to the general crash site area. Over the next 8 weeks of observation by U.S. naval units this number grew to a daily average of 19 Soviet naval, naval-associated and commercial (but undoubtedly naval subordinated) ships in the Search and Salvage (SAS) area. The number of Soviet ships in the SAS area over this period ranged from a minimum of six to a maximum of thirty-two and included at least forty-eight different ships comprising forty different ship classes.”

These missions met with interference by the Soviets, in violation of the 1972 Incident at Sea agreement, and included false flag and fake light signals, sending an armed boarding party to threaten to board a U.S.-chartered Japanese auxiliary vessel (blocked by U.S. warship interposition), interfering with a helicopter coming off the , attempted ramming of rigs used by the South Koreans in their quadrant search, hazardous maneuvering of the Gavril Sarychev and near collision with the , removing U.S. sonars, setting false pingers in deep international waters, sending Backfire bombers armed with air-to-surface nuclear-armed missiles to threaten U.S. naval units, criss-crossing in front of U.S. combatant vessels, cutting and attempted cuttings of moorings of the Japanese auxiliary vessels, particularly the Kaiko Maru III, and radar lock-ons by a Soviet , the Petropavlosk, and a , the Odarennyy, targeting U.S. naval vessels. , escorting , experienced all of the above interference and was involved in a near-collision with the Odarennyy.

U.S.

Task Force 71 After action report map of search area in international waters

According to the ICAO: "The location of the main wreckage was not determined… the approximate position was , which was in international waters." This point is about from Moneron Island, about from the shore of Sakhalin and from the point of attack.

Rear Admiral Walter T. Piotti Jr, commander of Task Force 71 of 7th Fleet, believed the search for KAL 007 in international waters to have been a search in the wrong place and assessed:

At a hearing of the ICAO on Sept.15, 1983, J. Lynn Helms, the head of the Federal Aviation Administration, stated: "The U.S.S.R. has refused to permit search and rescue units from other countries to enter Soviet territorial waters to search for the remains of KAL 007. Moreover, the Soviet Union has blocked access to the likely crash site and has refused to cooperate with other interested parties, to ensure prompt recovery of all technical equipment, wreckage and other material."

Political events

The shootdown happened at a very tense time in U.S.-Soviet relations during the Cold War. The U.S. adopted a strategy of releasing a substantial amount of hitherto highly classified intelligence information in order to exploit a major propaganda advantage over the U.S.S.R. Six hours after the plane was downed, the South Korean government issued an announcement that the plane had merely been forced to land abruptly by the Russians, and that all passengers and crew were safe.

Secretary of State George Schultz held a press conference about the incident at 10:45 on September 1, during which he divulged some details of intercepted Soviet communications and denounced the actions of the Soviet Union.

General Secretary Yuri Andropov, on the advice of Defense Minister Dmitriy Ustinov, but against advice of the Foreign Ministry, initially decided not to make any admission of downing the airline, on the premise that no-one would find out or be able to prove otherwise. Consequently the TASS news agency reported twelve hours after the shootdown only that an unidentified aircraft, flying without lights, had been intercepted by Soviet fighters after it violated Soviet airspace over Sakhalin. The aircraft had allegedly failed to respond to warnings and "continued its flight toward the Sea of Japan". Some commentators believe that the manner in which the political events were handled by the Soviet government was affected by the failing health of Andropov, who was permanently hospitalised in late September or early October 1983.

On September 5, 1983, U.S. President Ronald Reagan condemned the shooting down of the airplane as the "Korean airline massacre", a "crime against humanity [that] must never be forgotten" and an "act of barbarism ... [and] inhuman brutality". The following day, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Jeane Kirkpatrick commissioned an audio-visual presentation in the United Nations Security Council, using audio tapes of the Soviet pilots' radio conversations and a map of Flight 007's path in depicting its shooting down. Following this presentation, TASS acknowledged for the first time that the aircraft had indeed been shot down after warnings were ignored. The Soviets challenged many of the facts presented by the U.S., and for the first time, mentioned the presence of a USAF RC-135 surveillance aircraft whose path had crossed that of KAL 007.

On 7 September, Japan and the United States jointly released a transcript of Soviet communications, intercepted by the listening post at Wakkanai, to an emergency session of the United Nations Security Council. US president Reagan issued a National Security Directive stating that the Soviets were not to be let off the hook, and initiating "a major diplomatic effort to keep international and domestic attention focused on the Soviet action." The move was seen by the Soviet leadership of confirmation of the West's bad intentions.

A high level U.S.-Soviet summit, the first in nearly a year, was scheduled for 8 September 1983 in Madrid. The Schultz–Gromyko meeting went ahead, but was overshadowed by the KAL 007 event. It ended acrimoniously, with Schultz stating: "Foreign Minister Gromyko's response to me today was even more unsatisfactory than the response he gave in public yesterday. I find it totally unacceptable." President Reagan ordered the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on September 15, 1983 to revoke the licence of Aeroflot Soviet Airlines to operate flights to and from the U.S. Aeroflot flights to North America were consequently available only through Canadian and Mexican cities, forcing the Soviet foreign minister to cancel his scheduled trip to the United Nations. Aeroflot service to the U.S. was not restored until April 29, 1986.

An emergency session of the ICAO was held in Montreal. On September 12, 1983, the Soviet Union was forced to use its veto to block a United Nations resolution condemning it for shooting down the aircraft.

Shortly after the Soviet Union shot down KAL 007, legislatures in New York and New Jersey denied Soviet aircraft landing rights, in violation of the United Nations Charter that required the host nation to allow all member countries access to the UN. In reaction, TASS and some at the UN raised the question of whether the UN should move its headquarters from the United States. Charles Lichenstein, acting US permanent representative to the UN under Ambassador Kirkpatrick, responded, "We will put no impediment in your way. The members of the US mission to the United Nations will be down at the dockside waving you a fond farewell as you sail off into the sunset." Administration officials were quick to announce that Lichenstein was speaking only for himself.

In the Cold War context of Operation RYAN, the Strategic Defence Initiative, Pershing II missile deployment in Europe, and the upcoming Exercise Able Archer, the Soviet Government perceived the incident with the Korean airliner to be a portent of war. The Soviet hierarchy took the official line that KAL Flight 007 was on a spy mission, as it "flew deep into Soviet territory for several hundred kilometres, without responding to signals and disobeying the orders of interceptor fighter planes". They claimed its purpose was to probe the air defences of highly sensitive Soviet military sites in the Kamchatka Peninsula and Sakhalin Island. The Soviet government expressed regret over the loss of life, but offered no apology and did not respond to demands for compensation. Instead, the U.S.S.R. blamed the CIA for this "criminal, provocative act", and argued that the U.S. case was incredible:

Investigations

NTSB

Since the aircraft had departed from US soil and US nationals had died in the incident, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) was legally required to investigate. On the morning of September 1, the NTSB chief in Alaska, James Michelangelo, received an order from the NTSB in Washington at the behest of the State Department requiring all documents relating to the NTSB investigation to be sent to Washington, and notifying him that the State Department would now conduct the investigation. The US State Department, after closing the NTSB investigation on the grounds that it was not an accident, pursued an ICAO investigation instead. Commentators such as Johnson point out that this action was illegal, and that in deferring the investigation to the ICAO, the Reagan administration effectively precluded any politically or militarily sensitive information from being subpoenaed that might have embarrassed the administration or contradicted its version of events. Unlike the NTSB, ICAO can subpoena neither persons nor documents and is dependent on the governments involved—in this incident, the United States, the Soviet Union, Japan, and South Korea—to supply evidence voluntarily.

Initial ICAO investigation (1983)

ICAO had only one experience of investigation of an air disaster prior to the KAL 007 shootdown. This was the incident of February 21, 1973, when Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 114 was shot down by Israeli F-4 jets over the Sinai Peninsula. ICAO convention required the state in whose territory the accident had taken place (the U.S.S.R.) to conduct an investigation together with the country of registration (South Korea), the country whose air traffic control the aircraft was flying under (Japan), as well as the aircraft's manufacturer (Boeing).

The ICAO investigation did not have the authority to compel the states involved to hand over evidence, instead having to rely on what they voluntarily submitted. Consequently, the investigation did not have access to sensitive evidence such as radar data, intercepts, ATC tapes, or the Flight Data Recorder (FDR) and Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) (whose discovery the U.S.S.R. had kept secret). A number of simulations were conducted with the assistance of Boeing and Litton (the manufacturer of the navigation system).

The ICAO released their report December 2, 1983, which concluded that the violation of Soviet airspace was accidental: One of two explanations for the aircraft's deviation was that the autopilot had remained in HEADING hold instead of INS mode after departing Anchorage. They postulated that this inflight navigational error was caused by either the crew's failure to select INS mode, or the inertial navigation's not activating when selected, because the aircraft was already too far off track. It was determined that the crew did not notice this error or subsequently perform navigational checks, that would have revealed that the aircraft was diverging further and further from its assigned route. This was later deemed to be caused by a "lack of situational awareness and flight deck coordination".

The report included a statement by the Soviet Government claiming "no remains of the victims, the instruments or their components or the flight recorders have so far been discovered". However, this statement was subsequently shown to be untrue by Boris Yeltsin's release in 1993 of a November 1983 memo from KGB head Viktor Chebrikov and Defence Minister Dmitry Ustinov to Yuri Andropov. This memo stated "In the third decade of October this year the equipment in question (the recorder of in-flight parameters and the recorder of voice communications by the flight crew with ground air traffic surveillance stations and between themselves) was brought aboard a search vessel and forwarded to Moscow by air for decoding and translation at the Air Force Scientific Research Institute." The Soviet Government statement would further be contradicted by Soviet civilian divers who later recalled that they viewed wreckage of the aircraft on the bottom of sea for the first time on September 15, two weeks after the plane had been shot down.

Following publication of the report, the ICAO adopted a resolution condeming the Soviet Union for the attack. Furthermore, the report led to a unanimous amendment in May 1994 to the Convention on International Civil Aviation that defined the use of force against civilian airliners in more detail. The amendment to section 3(d) reads in part: "The contracting States recognize that every State must refrain from resorting to the use of weapons against civil aircraft in flight and that, in case of interception, the lives of persons on board and the safety of aircraft must not be endangered."

U.S. Air Force radar data

It is customary for the Air Force to impound radar trackings involving possible litigation in cases of aviation accidents. In the civil litigation for damages, the United States Department of Justice explained that the tapes from the Air Force radar installation at King Salmon, Alaska pertinent to KAL 007's flight in the Bethel area had been destroyed and could therefore not be supplied to the plaintiffs. At first Justice Department lawyer Jan Van Flatern stated that they were destroyed 15 days after the shootdown. Later, he said he had "misspoken" and changed the time of destruction to 30 hours after the event. A Pentagon spokesman concurred, saying that the tapes are re-cycled for reuse from 24–30 hours afterwards, however the fate of KAL 007 was known inside this timeframe.

Interim developments

Hans Ephraimson-Abt, whose daughter Alice Ephraimson-Abt had died on the flight, chaired the American Association for Families of KAL 007 Victims. He single-handedly pursued three US administrations for answers about the flight, flying to Washington 250 times and meeting with 149 State Department officials. Following the dissolution of the U.S.S.R., Ephraimson-Abt persuaded US Senators Ted Kennedy, Sam Nunn, Carl Levin, and Bill Bradley to write to the Soviet President, Mikhail Gorbachev requesting information about the flight. Glasnost reforms in the same year brought about a relaxation of press censorship; consequently reports started to appear in the Soviet press suggesting that the Soviet military knew the location of the wreckage and had possession of the flight data recorders. In December 1991, Senator Jesse Helms of the Committee on Foreign Relations, wrote to Boris Yeltsin requesting information concerning the survival of passengers and crew of KAL 007 including the fate of Congressman Larry McDonald.

On June 17, 1992, President Yeltsin revealed that after the 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt, concerted attempts were made to locate Soviet-era documents relating to KAL 007. He mentioned the discovery of "a memorandum from K.G.B. to the Central Committee of the Communist Party", stating that a tragedy had taken place and adding that there are documents "which would clarify the entire picture". Yeltsin said the memo continued to say that "these documents are so well concealed that it is doubtful that our children will be able to find them." On September 11, 1992, Yeltsin officially acknowledged the existence of the black boxes, and promised to give South Korean Government a transcript of the flight recorder contents as found in KGB files.

Dmitri Ustinov

In October 1992, Hans Ephraimson-Abt led a delegation of families and US State Department officials to Moscow at the invitation of President Yeltsin. During a state ceremony at St. Catherine's Hall in the Kremlin, the KAL family delegation was handed a portfolio containing partial transcripts of the KAL 007 cockpit voice recorder, translated into Russian, and documents of the Politburo pertaining the tragedy.

In November 1992, President Yeltsin handed the two black box containers to Korean President Roh Tae-Woo, but not the tapes themselves; The following month, the ICAO voted to reopen the KAL 007 investigation in order to take the newly released information in account. The tapes were handed to ICAO in Paris on 8 January 1993. Also handed over at the same time were tapes of the ground to air communications of the Soviet military. The tapes were transcribed by the Bureau d'Enquêtes et d'Analyses pour la sécurité de l'Aviation Civile (BEA) in Paris in the presence of representatives from Japan, The Russian Federation, South Korea, and the United States.

A 1993 official enquiry by the Russian Federation absolved the Soviet hierarchy of blame, determining that the incident was a case of mistaken identity. On May 28, 1993, the ICAO presented its second report to the Secretary-General of the United Nations.

Soviet memoranda

In 1992, Russian president Boris Yeltsin disclosed five top-secret memos dating from a few weeks after of the downing of KAL 007 in 1983. The memos contained Soviet communications (from KGB Chief Viktor Chebrikov and Defence Minister Dmitry Ustinov to Premier Yury Andropov) that indicated that they knew the location of KAL 007's wreckage while they were simulating a search and harassing the American Navy; they had found the sought-after flight data recorder on October 20, 1983 (50 days after the incident), and had decided to keep this knowledge secret, the reason being that the tapes could not unequivocally support their firmly held view that KAL 007's flight to Soviet territory was a deliberately planned intelligence mission.

The Mikhail Merchink.

Lead Soviet vessel in simulated search

The third memo acknowledges that analysis of the black box tapes showed no evidence of the Soviet interceptor attempting to contact KAL 007 via radio nor any indication that the KAL 007 crew was aware of warning shots being fired. "However in case the flight recorders shall become available to the western countries their data may be used for: Confirmation of no attempt by the intercepting aircraft to establish a radio contact with the intruder plane on 121.5 MHz and no tracers warning shots in the last section of the flight"

That the Soviet search was simulated (while knowing the wreckage lay elsewhere) also is suggested by the article of Mikhail Prozumentshchikov, Deputy Director of the Russian State Archives of Recent History, commemorating the twentieth anniversary of the airplane's shooting down. Commenting on the Soviet and American searches: "Since the U.S.S.R., for natural reasons, knew better where the Boeing had been downed...it was very problematical to retrieve anything, especially as the U.S.S.R. was not particularly interested".

Revised ICAO report (1993) - "The Report of the Completion of the Fact Finding Investigation..."

On November 18, 1992, Russian President Boris Yeltsin, in a goodwill gesture to South Korea during a visit to Seoul to ratify a new treaty, released both the flight data recorder (FDR) and cockpit voice recorder (CVR) of KAL 007. Initial South Korean research showed the FDR to be empty and the CVR to have an unintelligible copy. The Russians then released the recordings to the ICAO Secretary General. The ICAO report continued to support the initial assertion that KAL 007 accidentally flew in Soviet airspace, after listening to the flight crew's conversations recorded by the CVR.

In addition, the Russian Federation released "Transcript of Communications. U.S.S.R. Air Defence Command Centres on Sakhalin Island" transcripts to ICAO—this new evidence triggered the revised ICAO report in 1993 and is appended to it. These transcripts (of two reels of tape, each containing multiple tracks) are time specified, some to the second, of the communications between the various command posts and other military facilities on Sakhalin from the time of the initial orders for the shootdown and then through the stalking of KAL 007 by Maj. Osipovoich in his Sukhoi 15 interceptor, the attack as seen and commented on by General Kornukov, Commander of Sokol Air Base, down the ranks to the Combat Controller Lt. Col. Titovnin, the post-attack flight of KAL 007 until it had reached Moneron Island, the descent of KAL 007 over Moneron, the initial Soviet SAR missions to Moneron, the futile search of the support interceptors for KAL 007 on the water, and ending with the debriefing of Osipovich on return to base. Some of the communications are the telephone conversations between superior officers and subordinates and involve commands to them, while other communications involve the recorded responses to what was then being viewed on radar tracking KAL 007. These multi-track communications from various command posts telecommunicating at the same minute and seconds as other command posts were communicating provide a "composite" picture of what was taking place.

The data from the CVR and the FDR revealed that the recordings broke off after the first minute and 44 seconds of KAL 007's post missile detonation 12 minute flight. ICAO notes that break off of tape is consonant with a high speed crash but indicates that there was no high speed crash at that time. "Spliced joints were found at approximately 108, 440, 442, and from the beginning of the tape. The middle two were spaced at a distance corresponding to the length of the tape between the two reels and the last data was recorded between these two joints. It was not unusual for the tape to break as a result of high speed impacts, near where it left the reels.". The remaining minutes of flight would be supplied by the Russia 1992 submission to ICAO of the real-time Soviet military communication of the shootdown and aftermath.

The fact that both recorder tapes stopped exactly at the same time 1 minute and 44 seconds after missile detonation (18:38:02 GMT) without the tape portions for the more than 10 minutes of KAL 007's post detonation flight before it descended below radar tracking (18:38 GMT) finds no explanation in the ICAO analysis, "It could not be established why both flight recorders simultaneously ceased to operate 104 seconds after the attack. The power supply cables were fed to the rear of the aircraft in raceways on opposite sides of the fuselage until they came together behind the two recorders."

Passenger pain and suffering

Passenger pain and suffering was an important factor in determining the level of compensation that was paid by Korean Air Lines.

Fragments from the proximity fused R-98 medium range air-to-air missile exploding behind the tail caused punctures to the pressurized passenger cabin. When one of the flight crew radioed Tokyo Area Control one minute and two seconds after missile detonation his breathing was already "accentuated", indicating to ICAO analysts that he was speaking through the microphone located in his oxygen mask, "Korean Air 007 ah... We are... Rapid compressions. Descend to 10,000."ICAO '93, p. 35

Two expert witnesses testified at a Court of Appeals trial on the issue of pre-death pain and suffering. Captain James McIntyre, an experienced Boeing 747 pilot and aircraft accident investigator, testified that shrapnel from the missile caused rapid decompression of the cabin, but left the passengers sufficient time to don oxygen masks: "McIntyre testified that, based upon his estimate of the extent of damage the aircraft sustained, all passengers survived the initial impact of the shrapnel from the missile explosion. In McIntyre's expert opinion, at least 12 minutes elapsed between the impact of the shrapnel and the crash of the plane, and the passengers remained conscious throughout."

Alternative theories

Flight 007 has been the subject of ongoing controversy and has spawned a number of conspiracy theories, many of which are rooted in Cold War disinformation and propaganda campaigns, the suppression of evidence such as the flight data recorders and unexplained details such as the role of a USAF RC-135 surveillance aircraft. The various theories that have been put forward generally reflect their authors' political orientations: Right-wing theories mirror the US government position in 1983, while left-wing theories reflect the Soviet position at the time. Some commentators also felt that the ICAO report failed to address key points adequately, such as the reason for the aircraft's deviation. The release of flight data recorder evidence in 1993 seriously challenged many of these theories.

One of the first theories was that Space Shuttle Challenger and a satellite were monitoring the airliner's progress over Soviet territory. Defence Attaché, which printed this claim, was sued by Korean Air Lines and forced to pay damages and print an apology.

In 1994, Robert W Allardyce and James Gollin wrote Desired Track: The Tragic Flight of KAL Flight 007, supporting the spy mission theory. In 2007, they reiterated their position in a series of articles in Airways Magazine, arguing that the investigation by the International Civil Aviation Organization was a cover-up of a "carefully planned ferret mission". Furthermore they suggested that the NSA had implemented Electronic Counter Measures to cover for the mission and that the "black box" tapes had been planted for the Soviet recovery effort to find.

Around the time that KAL 007 entered Soviet airspace, a United States Air Force RC-135 reconnaissance plane was in the area to capture the telemetry of an intercontinental ballistic missile that was to hit the Klyuchi target range on Kamchatka. The United States military has not disclosed the capabilities and role of this aircraft. During the civil litigation for damages to the families of the victims of the shoot-down, Chief Justice of the District Court of Washington, D.C., Aubrey Robinson ruled out legal recourse to finding out on grounds that it would endanger U.S. national security. On April 18, 1984, he allowed questions to the military, "but only in respect to uncovering the legal duty of the military to warn or advise civilian aircraft."

In January 1996, Hans Ephraimson, chairman of the "American Association for Families of KAL 007 Victims", claimed that South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan accepted $4 million from Korean Air in order to gain "government protection" during the investigation of the shootdown.

More recently in 2000, Rescue 007: Untold Story of KAL 007 and its Survivors by Bert Schlossberg, which is promoted by the International Committee for the Rescue of KAL 007 Survivors, advanced a theory that KAL 007, though crippled, was able to land on water safely enough for at least some of its occupants to have been rescued by the Soviets in Soviet territorial waters, then retained, finally to be incarcerated in various locations in the Soviet Union. This best explains, according to the organization, the Soviet nine-year concealment of both the black box tapes and immediate Search and Rescue mission to Moneron , the lack of bodies, body parts, and luggage, reports of survivor sightings, and the reported Soviet harassment of U.S. search efforts and preventing conducting of the search in Soviet waters. The organization believes that there is credible evidence concerning the subsequent whereabouts of passengers Congressman Larry McDonald and 5 year old Noelle Anne Grenfell to reopen the investigation into the shootdown and aftermath.

Though independent of the initiative by Senator Jesse Helms to launch a CIA investigation of the shootdown while he was ranking member of the Minority Staff (Republican) of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, the International Committee for the Rescue of KAL 007 Survivors is undertaking a dissemination to the media of the 1991 Republican staff study on the shootdown. The organization fully supports both the Helms letter to Yeltsin requesting information about survivors, including Larry McDonald, and supports the conclusion of the study, “KAL 007 probably ditched successfuly, there may have been survivors, the Soviets have been lying massively, and diplomatic efforts need to be made to return the possible survivors.”

Another theory was suggested by Michael Brun in his book Incident at Sakhalin: The True Mission of KAL Flight 007. According to this book, KAL007 was involved in a spy mission intended to trigger Soviet air defences and to cover the missions of several USAF spy airplanes. The Korean aircraft was communicating with Tokyo-Narita controllers around half an hour after the official time of the shootdown. A large air battle occurred between Soviet Air Force and USAF, during which the Soviets shot down several American aircraft, including an RC-135, an EF-111 and probably even an SR-71. The SU-15 pilot, Major Osipovich, flew two sorties and shot down two targets (contradicted by the 1991 interview with Osipovich). The whereabouts of the KAL-007 wreckage is not known to anyone, but is probably away from the Moneron island. The theory postulates further that the real cause of the destruction is not known, but could have been a surface-to-air missile fired from (similar case with shooting down of Iran Air Flight 655) or from Japanese forces, who could not identify the airliner which was keeping radio silence.

Aftermath

The FAA temporarily closed Airway R-20, the air corridor that Korean Air Flight 007 was meant to follow, on September 2. However airlines fiercely resisted the closure of this popular route, the shortest of five corridors spanning Alaska and the Far East. It was therefore reopened on October 2 after safety and navigational aids were checked

NATO had decided, under the impetus of the Reagan administration, to deploy Pershing II and cruise missiles in West Germany. This deployment would have placed missiles just 6–10 minutes striking distance from Moscow. Support for the deployment was wavering and it looked doubtful that it would be carried out. However when the Soviet Union shot down Flight 007, the U.S. was able to galvanize enough support at home and abroad to enable the deployment to go ahead.

The unprecedented disclosure of the communications intercepted by the United States and Japan revealed a considerable amount of information about their intelligence systems and capabilities. National Security Agency director Lincoln D. Faurer commented: "...as a result of the Korean Air Lines affair, you have already heard more about my business in the past two weeks than I would desire...For the most part this has not been a matter of unwelcome leaks. It is the result of a conscious, responsible decision to address an otherwise unbelievable horror." Changes that the Soviets subsequently made to their codes and frequencies reduced the effectiveness of this monitoring by 60%.

The U.S. KAL 007 Victims' Association, under the leadership of Hans Ephraimson-Abt, successfully lobbied U.S. Congress and the airline industry to accept an agreement that would ensure that future victims of airline accidents would be compensated quickly and fairly by increasing compensation and lowering the burden of proof of airliner misconduct. This legislation has had far-reaching effects for the victims of subsequent aircraft disasters.

The U.S. decided to utilize military radars to extend air traffic control radar coverage from to out from Anchorage. In 1986, the United States, Japan and the Soviet Union set up a joint air traffic control system to monitor aircraft over the North Pacific, thereby giving the Soviet Union formal responsibility to monitor civilian air traffic, and setting up direct communication links between the controllers of the three countries.

Ronald Reagan announced on September 16, 1983 that the Global Positioning System (GPS) would be made available for civilian use, free of charge, once completed in order to avert similar navigational errors in future. Furthermore, the interface of the autopilot used on large airlines was modified to make it more obvious whether it is operating in HEADING mode or INS mode.

Alvin Snyder, the director of worldwide television for the United States Information Agency, was the producer of the video shown to the U.N. Security Council on September 6, 1983. In an article in Washington Post on September 1, 1996, he stated that he had been given only limited access to the transcripts of the Russian communication when he produced the video in 1983. When he received full insight into the Russian transmissions in 1993, he says he realised that: "The Russians believed the plane to be a RC-135 reconnaissance plane" and that "Osipovich (the Russian fighter pilot) could not identify the plane" and "That he fired warning cannons and tipped his wings, an international signal to force the plane to land". Some of these statements were contradicted by the pilot in an interview with the New York Times, in which he confirmed that he did fire warning shots, but that they would not have been visible as they were not tracers.

In a March 15, 2001 interview, Valeri Kamenski, then Commander of the Soviet Far East Military District Air Defense Force and direct superior to Gen. Kornukov, opined that such a shootdown of a civilian passenger plane could not happen again in view of the changing political conditions and alliances. In this interview, Kaminski stated, “It is still a mystery what happened to the bodies of the crew and passengers on the plane. According to one theory, right after the rocket’s detonation, the nose and tail section of the jumbo fell off and the mid fuselage became a sort of wind tunnel so the people were swept through it and scattered over the surface of the ocean. Yet in this case, some of the bodies were to have been found during the search operations in the area. The question of what actually happened to the people has not been given a distinct answer.”

Flight timeline and transcripts

The following transcript is compiled from Japanese electronic intercepts of Soviet Su-15 transmissions, a transcript of communications of U.S.S.R. Air Defence Command Centres on Sakhalin Island (released in 1993), civil air traffic controller recordings from Tokyo and Anchorage, and the KAL 007 cockpit voice recorder (released in 1993). The ICAO co-ordinated the times of Soviet transmissions with partial, but time-stamped communications intercepted by Japan. Some Air Combat Controller fighter vectoring, fuel read-outs and inter-command post "chatter" is not included.

Speaker	Source of transcript
Soviet ground controllers and command posts	1993 Russian transcript
Soviet fighter pilots	1983 US-Japanese intercept of pilot transmissions/1993 Russian transcript
KAL 007 cockpit/cabin	1993 CVR
KAL 007 radio transmissions	ATC recording
Tokyo/Anchorage ATC	ATC recording/CVR
Other	Radar/ATC/FDR

Time (UTC)	Comment
1250:12	KAL is cleared for take-off in AnchorageKAL 007: "Uh clearance Korean 007, uh have information sierra Seoul at three one zero"
1250:18	Anchorage ATC: "Korean Air 007 heavy is cleared to Seoul via the Anchorage eight departure then as filed climb and maintain flight level 310; departure frequency 118.6, squawk 6072"
1250:34	KAL 007: "Korean 007 cleared to Seoul; Anchorage eight departure, climb and maintain 310; 1186 6072"
1250:43	Anchorage ATC: "Korean 007 heavy read back was correct"
1258:33	KAL 007: "Korean 007 ready for takeoff"
1258:36	ATC "Korean 007 heavy roger; departure frequency will be 118.3, same as tower; cleared for takeoff, runway 32.
1301:12	ATC "Korean 007 heavy, Anchorage departure. Radar contact - climb and maintain flight level 310. Turn left heading 220"
1301:22	KAL 007: "Roger 220 climb and maintain 310 roger"
1303:07	Pilot engaged autopilot on a heading of 220 degrees.
1303:30	Estimated point that the pilot selected INS mode.
1327:50	KAL flies beyond the range of Anchorage civilian radar coverage"ATC: "Korean Air zero zero seven radar service is terminated. Contact Center 125.2 good morning"
1327:53	KAL 007: "KE007 two five two good morning"
1328:01	KAL 007 reports climbing to : "Anchorage Center Korean Air 007, good morning. Now leaving 300 for 310"
1328:06	ATC: "Korean Air 007 roger, report Bethel"
1328:11	KAL 007: "Report Bethel roger"
1330	KAL 007 off course at Cairn Mountain.
1350	KAL 007 off course at Bethel.
1350:09	KAL 007 reports reaching Bethel: "Anchorage, Korean Air 007"
1350:12	ATC: "Korean Air 007, go ahead"
1350:14	KAL 007: "007 Bethel at 49, flight level 310. Estimate NABIE at 1430 219.0 minus 49295 diagonal 25" (But according to King Salmon military radar, KAL 007 is actually 12.6 nm off course)
1350:28	ATC: "Korean Air zero zero seven roger report NABIE to Anchorage on 1278"
1350:33	KAL 007: "1278 roger"
1350:42	ATC: "Go ahead"
1350:43	KAL 015, that had taken off 15 minutes after KAL 007 and is also flying on route Romeo 20, reports over VHF for KAL 007, which is too far off course to itself report over VHF, that KAL 007 has reached waypoint NABIE: "Korean Air 007 says NABIE one four three zero TJ"
1551	KAL 007 entered Soviet airspace over the Kamchatka Peninsula.
1745	KAL 007 re-entered international airspace over the Sea of Okhotsk.
1749	Capt. Solodkov: "Two pilots have just been sent up, command at the command post, we do not know what is happening just now, it's heading straight for our Island [Sakhalin], to Terpienie [Bay] somehow, this looks very suspicious to me, I don't think the enemy is stupid, can it be one of ours?"
1753	First documented order for shootdown.General Anatoli Kornukov (Photo), commander of Sokol Air base on Sakhalin to the command post of General Valeri Kamenski, Commander of Air Defense Forces for the Far East Military District, "...simply destroy [it] even if it is over neutral waters? Are the orders to destroy it over neutral waters? Oh, well."
1754:26	The Cockpit Voice Recorder records about the last half hour of an aircraft's flight continually playing over itself as the flight progresses. KAL 007's CVR tape (as well as the tape of the Flight Data Recorder) was stopped one minute and 44 seconds after missile detonation at 18:26:02, though the flight would continue for over 10 minutes more. Here is the beginning of the half hour taping of KAL 007's Flight Deck conversation:
1754:26	Flight Deck: "Have you had a long flight recently?"
1754:28	Flight Deck: "From time to time"
1754:30	Flight Deck: "Sounds good, as far as I know Chief Pilot Park has a long flight occasionally, but Chief Pilot Lee has..."
1800	Ground controllers are given orders on how to direct the jets to intercept the Korean airlinerKornukov: "Bring him up, bring Osipovich in to the prescribed distance. You do not engage him to the target from the aft hemisphere, you do not engage him right on the tail, keep the angle of approach."Kozlov [Fighter Control, Sokol airbase]: "Roger, executing. "Kornukov: "Don't forget, it [the target] has cannons in the rear there"Kozlov: "Roger, executing.Kornukov: But faster, for the fighter, rather, the target is entering the zone above the one-hundred-kilometers waters [identification zone]."Kozlov: "Wilco"
1804–05	KAL 007, off course, and KAL 015, on course, compare wind velocity and direction. KAL 015 is enountering tailwinds while KAL 007 is encountering headwindsKAL 015: "Um Um We are now having an unexpected strong tailwind How much do you get there? How much and which direction?"KAL 007: "206. Ask him how many knots?..."KAL 007: "Ah! You got so much! We still got headwind. Headwind 215 degrees, 15 knots."KAL 015: "Is it so? But according to flight plan wind direction 360, 15 knots approximately."KAL 007: "Well, it may be like this."
1805:53	Maj. Osipovich, callsign "805", in his Su-15 intercepted KAL 007: "On heading 240"
1805:56	Osipovich: "Am observing."
1808	Kozlov (Combat Controller Sokol Airbase): "He has the target in sight"Kornukov: "He can see it? How many jet trails are coming from it?"Kozlov: "Say again, Kornukov: How many jet trails are there, if there are four jet trails, then it's an RC-135"
1811:30–39	KAL 007 Flight Crew: "I have heard that there is currency exchange at your airport." "In the airport currency exchange? What kind of money?" "Dollar to Korean money." "That's in the domestic building too, domestic building too."
1811	Air Controller Titovnin: "Can you see the target, 805?"
1811	Osipovich: "I see both visually and on the screen".
1811	Lt. Col. Titovnin: "Roger, report lock-on".
1812	Kornukov: "Gerasimenko!"Lt. Col. Gerasimenko (41st fighter Regiment Command Post): "Yes"Kornukov: "Well, what, don't you understand? I said bring [him] up to a range of 4 kilometers, 4–5 kilometers, identify the target. You understand that weapons are going to have to be used now and you are holding [him] at a range of 10. Give the pilot [his] orders."
1812	Radar at Wakkanai picked up KAL 007 for the first time.
1813:05	Osipovich: "I see it. I am locked onto the target."
1813	General Kornukov: "Chaika" (Call sign for Far East Military District Air Defence Forces). Titovnin: "Yes, sir. He sees [it] on the radar screen, He sees [it] on the screen, He has locked on, he is locked on, he is locked on."
18:13:26	Osipovich: "The target isn't responding to the call."
1813	Titovnin: 805, Is the target's heading 240?
1813:35	Osipovich: "Affirmative. The target's heading is 240 degrees."
1813	Titovnin: Roger, arm your weapons
1813	Osipovich: Turned on
1814	Gen Kornukov to Gen. Kamenski: "Comrade General, Kamenski, Good morning. I am reporting the situation. Target 60-65 is over Terpenie Bay [East Coast of Sakhalin] tracking 240, 30 kilometers from the State Border. The fighter from Sokol is 6 kilometers away. Locked on, orders were given to arm weapons. The target is not respondeing to identify. He cannot identify it visually because it is still dark, but he is still locked on."Gen. Kamenski: "We must find out, maybe it is some civilian craft or God knows who."Kornukov: "What civilian? [It] has flown over Kamchatka! It [came] from the ocean without identification. I am giving the order to attack if it crosses the State border."
1814:59	KAL 007 contacted Tokyo air traffic control requesting permission to climb to FL 350 [35,000 feet].
1814:59	KAL 007: "Tokyo Radio Korean Air zero zero seven"
1815	Titovnin: "Maistrenko Comrade Colonel, that is, Titovnin."Col. Maistrenko (Operations Duty Officer, Combat Control Center): "Yes".Titovnin: "The commander has given orders that if the border is violated—destroy [the target]."Maistrenko: "...May [be] a passenger [aircraft]. All necessary steps must be taken to identify it."Titovnin: "Identification measures are being taken, but the pilot cannot see. It's dark. Even now it's still dark." Maistrenko: "Well, okay. The task is correct. If there are no lights—it cannot be a passenger [aircraft]."
1815:03	Tokyo radio: "Korean Air zero zero seven Tokyo"
1815:07	KAL 007: "Korean Air zero zero seven requesting climb three five zero"
1815:13	Tokyo radio: "Requesting three five zero?"
1815:15	KAL 007: "That is affirmative now maintain at three three zero Korean Air zero zero seven"
1815:19	Tokyo radio: "Roger stand by call you back"
1815:21	KAL 007: "Roger"
1815:21	Flight deck: "Oh my God! This radio is very bad"
1815:52	[Audible morse transmission starts]
1817:44	KAL 007: "Korean Air zero zero seven Secal"
1820:11	Toyko radio: "Korean Air zero zero seven. Clearance Tokyo ATC clears Korean Air zero zero seven climb and maintain flight level 350"
1820:21	KAL 007: "Ah roger Korean Air 007 climb and maintain at 350 leaving 330 at this time."
1820:28	Tokyo radio: "Tokyo roger."
1821:35	Osipovich: "Yes, I'm approaching the target. I'm going in closer."
1821:35	Osipovich: "The target's light is blinking. I have already approached the target to a distance of about 2 kilometers."
1821:40	Osipovich: "The target is at ."
1821:55	Osipovich: "What are instructions?"
1822:02	KAL 007 decreased speed as it climbed, causing the pursuing fighter to draw abeam of it.Osipovich: "The target is decreasing speed."
1822:17	Osipovich: "I am going around it. I'm already moving in front of the target."
1822:17	Titovnin: "Increase speed, 805" [call sign of Osipovich's Sukhoi].
1822:23	Osipovich: "I have increased speed."
1822:23	Titovnin: "Has the target increased speed, yes?"
1822:29	Osipovich: "No, it is decreasing speed."
1822:29	Titovnin: "805, open fire on target."
1822:42	Osipovich: "It should have been earlier. How can I chase it? I'm already abeam of the target."
1822:42	Titovnin: "Roger, if possible, take up a position for attack."
1822:55	Osipovich: "Now I have to fall back a bit from the target."
1821–22	Kornukov: "Gerasimenko, cut the horseplay at the command post, what is that noise there? I repeat the combat task: fire missiles, fire on target 60-65." Gerasimenko: "Wilco" Kornukov: "Comply and get Tarasov here. Take control of the Mig-23 from Smirnykh, call sign 163, call sign 163, he is behind the target at the moment. Destroy the target!" Gerasimenko: "Task received. Destroy target 60-65 with missile fire, accept control of fighter from Smirnykh" Kornukov: "Carry out the task, destroy [it]!"
1822:55	Gen. Kornukov: "Oh, [‍expletives‍] how long does it take him to get into attack position, he is already getting out into neutral waters? Engage afterburner immediately. Bring in the MiG 23 as well... While you are wasting time it will fly right out."Titovnin: "805, try to destroy the target with cannons."
1822:56	The Boeing reports reaching its newly assigned altitudeKAL 007: "Tokyo Radio Korean Air 007 reaching level three five zero".
1823:37	Osipovich: "I am dropping back. Now I will try a rocket."
1823:37	Titovnin: "Roger."
1823:49	MiG 23 (163): "Twelve kilometers to the target. I see both [the Soviet interceptor piloted by Osipovich and KAL 007]."
18:23:37	Titovnin: "805, approach target and destroy target."
1824:22	Osipovich: "Roger, I am in lock-on."
1824:22	Titovnin: "805, are you closing on the target?"
1825:11	Osipovich: "I am closing on the target, am in lock-on. Distance to target is 8 kilometers."
1825:11	Titovnin: "Afterburner. AFTERBURNER, 805!"
1825:16	Osipovich: "I have already switched it on."
1825:16	Titovnin: "Launch!"
1825:46	Osipovich: "Z.G." (Fuel panel light)
1826:02	Cockpit: [Sound of explosion?]
1826:06	Captain: "What's happened?"
1826:08	Co-pilot: "What?"
1826:10	Captain: "Retard throttles."
1826:11	Co-Pilot: "Engines normal."
1826:14	Captain: "Landing gear."
1826:15	Cockpit: [Sound of cabin altitude warning]
1826:17	Captain: "Landing gear."
1826:18	Cockpit: [Sound of altitude deviation warning]
1826:20	Osipovich: "I have executed the launch."
1826	Kornukov: "Well, what do you hear there?"Gerasimenko: "He has launched"Kornukov: "I did not understand"Gerasimenko: "He has launched"Kornukov: "He has launched, follow the target, follow the target, withdraw yours from the attack and bring the MiG-23 in there."
1826:21	Cockpit: [Sound of autopilot disconnect warning]
1826:22	Captain: "Altitude is going up. Altitude is going up. Speed brake is coming out." [Flight Data Recorder will show that speed brake had not deployed]
1826:22	Major Osipovich mistakenly (as subsequent Russian real-time military telecommunications show) reports the Boeing is destroyedOsipovich: "The target is destroyed."
1826:22	Titovnin: "Break off attack to the right, heading 360."
1826:26	Co-Pilot: "What? What?"
1826:27	Osipovich: "I am breaking off attack."
1826:27	Cockpit: [Unintelligible]
1826:29	Captain: "Check it out."
1826:33	Captain: "I am not able to drop altitude."
1826:33	MiG-23: "What are (my) instructions?"
1826:34	Public Address: "Attention emergency descent"
1826:38	Public Address: "Attention emergency descent"
1826:38	Crew: "Altitude is going up."
1826:40	Crew: "This is not working. This is not working."
1826:41	Crew: "Manually."
1826:42	Crew: "Cannot do manually."
1826:42	Public Address: "Attention emergency descent"
1826:43	Cockpit: [Sound of the autopilot disconnect warning] ICAO graphing of Digital Flight Data Recorder tapes will show that autopilot has now been disengaged and manual control begun. KAL 007 now begins descent phase of arc.
1826:45	Co-Pilot: "Engines are normal sir."
1826:46	Public Address: "Put out your cigarette. This is an emergency descent."
1826:47	MiG-23: "My wing tanks have lit up. The fuel remainder differs by 600 litres for now.
1826:48	Cockpit: [Unintelligible]
1826:49	Public Address: "Put out your cigarette. This is an emergency descent."
1826:50	Captain: "Is it power compression?"
1826:51	Flight Engineer: "Is that right?"
1826:52	Public Address: "Put out your cigarette, this is an emergency descent."
1826:52	Flight Engineer: "All of both."
1826:53	Osipovich: "Fuel remainder 1,600"
1826:54	Captain: "Is that right?"
1826:55	Public Address: "Put the mask over your nose and mouth and adjust the headband."
1826:57	Co-Pilot: "Tokyo radio Korean Air 007."
1826	Soviet commanders become aware that target is not destroyed. Lt. Col Novoseltski: "Well, what is happening, what is the matter, who guided him in, he locked on, why didn't he shoot it down?"
1827:01	Public Address: "Put the mask over your nose and mouth and adjust the headband."
1827:01	Osipovich: "I am executing. What is the distance to the airfield?"
1827:02	Tokyo radio: "Korean Air 007, Tokyo."
1827:04	"Accentuated breathing during the transmission indicated that an oxygen mask was being worn" Co-Pilot: "Roger, Korean Air 007...ah, we are experiencing..."
1827:05	Osipovich: "Roger"
1827:08	Public Address: "Put the mask over your nose and mouth and adjust the headband."
1827:08	MiG-23: "What heading?"
1827:09	Flight Engineer: "All compression."
1827:10	Captain: "Rapid decompression. Descend to one zero thousand."
1827:15	Public Address: "Attention emergency descent."
1827:20	ICAO graphing of Digital Flight Data Recorder tapes now show that after a descent phase and a 10 second "nose-up", KAL 007 is now leveled out at pre-missile detonation altitude of 35,000 ft., forward acceleration is now back to pre-missile detonation rate of zero acceleration, and air speed has returned to pre-detonation velocity. Yaw (occilations), begun at the time of missile detonation, continue decreasingly until the end of the minute 44 second porton of CVR tape
1827:20	Flight Engineer: "Now...we have to set this."
1827:21	Tokyo radio: "Korean Air 007, radio check on one zero zero four eight."
1827:23	Public Address: "Attention emergency descent."
1827:23	Flight Engineer: "Speed."
1827:26	Flight Engineer: "Stand by. Stand by. Stand by. Stand by. Set."
1827:27	Public Address: "Put out your cigarette. This is an emergency descent."
1827:29	MiG-23: "I'm executing left to a heading of 180. (Altitude) "
1827:30	Public Address: "Put out your cigarette. This is an emergency descent."
1827:33	Public Address: "Put out your cigarette this is an emergency descent."
1827:38	Public Address: "Put the mask over your nose and mouth and adjust the headband."
1827:43	Public Address: "Put the mask over your nose and mouth and adjust..."
1827:46	End of CVR recording
1827:53	MiG-23: "Heading 150, Roger."
1827	Kornukov: "Did Osipovich see the missiles explode? Hello?" Gerasimenko: "He fired two missiles." Kornukov: "Ask him, ask him yourself, get on channel three and ask Osipovich did he or did he not see the explosions?" Gerasimenko: "Right away" Gerasimenko" "805, did you launch one missile or both?"
1828:05	Osipovich: "I launched both"
1828:08	Tokyo radio – KAL 007: (Selcal 007)
1828:20	MiG-23: "Roger, heading 150, 7,500"
1828:26	Tokyo radio-KAL 007: (Selcal 007)
1828:29	MiG-23: "Executing heading 210"
1828:35	MiG-23: "I executed"
1828:40	Tokyo radio-KAL 007: (Selcal 007)
1828:51	MiG-23: "Roger heading 210, "
1828	Lt. Col. Gerasimienko: "The target turned to the north." Gen. Kornukov: "The target turned to the north?" Gerasimienko: "Affirmative." Kornukov: "Bring the [MiG] 23 in to destroy it!"
1828:52	Tokyo radio-KAL 007: Korean Air zero zero seven Tokyo
1829:12	Tokyo radio-KAL 007: Korean Air zero zero seven Tokyo
1829	Gen. Kornukov: Well, I understand, I do not understand the result, why is the target flying? Missiles were fired. Why is the target flying? [obscenities] Well, what is happening?" Well, I am asking, give the order to the Controller, what is wrong with you there? Have you lost your tongues? Gerasimenko: I gave the order to the Chief of Staff, the Chief of Staff to the Controller, and the Controller is giving he order to... Kornukov (1830): Well how long does it take for this information to get through, well, what, [you] cannot ask the results of firing the missiles, where, what, did [he] not understand or what?
1829:13	The Soviet pilots unsuccessfully tried to locate the wreckage of KAL 007
1829:13	MiG-23 pilot says of their target: "No, I don't see it."
1829:20	Tokyo radio-KAL 007: (Selcal 007)
1829:21	MiG-23 "Executing heading 360."
1829:50	MiG-23 "Roger, taking a heading of 360."
1830:00	Tokyo radio-KAL 007: (Selcal 007)
1830	KAL 007 was last seen by radar at Wakkanai at a height of 5,000 meters (16,424 ft)
1830–34/35	KAL 007 will continue at altitude level 5,000 meters for almost 5 minutes until over Moneron Island.
1830:42	Tokyo radio-KAL 007: (Selcal)
1831:04–28	Tokyo radio-KAL 015: Roger. Would you attempt to contact Korean Air zero zero seven Korean Air zero zero seven and, er....relay his position please? KAL 015: Roger Stand by KAL 015-KAL 007: Zero zero seven, KAL 015-KAL 007: Zero zero seven, KAL 015-KAL 007: Zero zero seven Korean Air zero zero zero one five
1832–33	Kornukov: Altitude, what is the altitude of our fighter and the altitude of the target?...Quickly, the altitude of the target and the altitude of the fighter!...Why don't you say anything?... Gerasimenko! Gerasimenko: I am asking... Kornukov: Hurry up, guys, that's a real target. Hello, Mastak, Mastak, Mastak,Mastak, Mastak, Mastak, Mastak, Mastak, Mastak[Call sign]
1833:05	KAL 015-Tokyo radio: Tokyo this is Korean Air 015
1833/34	KAL 007 was seen by Soviet radar at 5,000 meters at initial stage of spiral descent over Moneron Island. Lt. Col. Gerasimenko: "Altitude of target is 5,000." General Kornukov: "5,000 already?" Gerasimenko: "Affirmative, turning left, right, apparently it is descending."
1833:08–1835:06	Tokyo radio-KAL 015: Korean Air zero one five go ahead KAL 015-Tokyo radio: Unable to contact Korean Air zero zero seven Tokyo radio-KAL 015: Ah would you use VHF please or VHF over KAL 015-Tokyo radio: Ah roger KAL 015-KAL 007: Korean Air zero zero seven zero one five, Korean Air zero zero seven zero one five KAL 015-Tokyo radio: Tokyo Korean Air zero one five unable to contact
18:34	Kornukov: "Destroy it, use the 23 to destroy it, I said!"
1834	Gerasimenko: "Roger, destroy it."
1834	Kornukov: "Well, where is the fighter, how far from the target?"
1834	Gerasimenko: "Comrade General, they cannot see the target."
1834	Kornukov: "They cannot see the target?"
1835	KAL 007 has now been tracked by Soviet radar as descended below 5,000 meters in its spiral over Moneron Island.
1835:54	Callsign 121: "No, I don't see it"
1836	Kornukov: "...you know the range, where the target is. It is over Moneron..."
1838:37	MiG-23: "I don't see anything in this area. I just looked."
1838	Titovnin: "They lost the target, Comrade Colonel, in the area of Moneron."
1838	Novoseletski: "In the area of Moneron?"
1838	Titovnin: "The pilots do not see it, neither the one nor the other. The radio forces have reported...that after the launch, the target entered a right turn over Moneron."
1838	Novoseletski: "Uh-huh."
1838	Titovnin: "Descending. And lost over Moneron"
1838	KAL 007 disappeared from radar (approximately 12 minutes after the initial attack) Soviet radar personnel stationed at Komsomolsk-na-Amure on the Siberian maritime reported KAL 007 disappearing from radar screen at altitude because of radar's inability to track below that altitude.
1838:37	The first Soviet pilot reiterates: "I don't see anything in this area. I just looked." With fuel running low the Soviet jets return to their base without sighting the remains of their target.
1839	Novoseletski: So, the task. They say it has violated the State border again, now? Titovnin: Well, it is in the area of Moneron, of course, over our territory. Novoseletski: Get it, Get it! Go ahead, bring in the MiG 23. Titovnin: Roger. The MiG 23 is in the area. It is descending to 5,000. The orders have been given: destroy upon detection.
1840:11	MiG-23: "I'm not able to determine the cloud base. The clouds are below me and I'm at ."
1841	Kornukov: Well, what [is happening] there. Has the [MiG] 23 reported anything, does he see [it] or not? Bring him down to 4,000. Have him look visually and on the radar sight.
1841:17	Tokyo radio-KAL 007: (Selcal 007)
1841:55	Last attempt of Tokyo radio to make contact Tokyo radio-KAL 007: Korean Air zero zero seven Korean Air zero zero seven this is Tokyo Radio if you read me re...request radio check Tokyo requests radio check one two seven decimal six one two seven decimal six
1845	Unidentified speakers: "Say again", "I cannot hear you clearly now", "He gave the order, hello, hello, hello", "Yes, yes", "Ivan Moiseevich gave the order. Tretyak", "Roger, roger", "Weapons were used at his orders." [General Ivan Moiseevich Tretyak, Commander of the Far East Military District]
1847	On order of Lt. Col. Novoseletski, Acting Commander of 41st Fighter wing at Smirnykh Air Base, KGB Border Guard boats ordered and rescue helicopters dispatched from Khomutovo military/civilian air base in southern Sakhalin. Novoseletski: "Prepare whatever helicpters there are. Rescue helicopters." Titovnin: "Rescue?" Novoseletski: "Yes. And there will probably be a task set for the area where the target was lost." Titovnin: "Roger. Is this to be done through your SAR? Assign the task through your CHAIKA ["Far East Military District Air Defense Forces" call sign, Comrade, Colonel, Khomutovo does not come under us and neither does Novoalexasndrovski. We have nothing here." Novoseletski: "Very well" Titovnin: "Novoalexandrovski must be brought to readiness and Khomutovo. The border guards and KGB are at Khomutovo."
1853	Kornukov: "What [happened] was it not destroyed?"
1853	Osipovich: "The target disappeared, but it was somehow descending slowly...either it was put out of action or it was damaged, it disappeared in the area of Moneron, no one can see it at the moment. Well, it looks as if it was put out of action."
1853	Kornukov: "Roger, good, we'll sort it out."
1853	Osipovich: "Uh-huh, Roger"
1855	Any civilian ships near Moneron sent to Moneron itself on order of Deputy Commander of Far East Military District (under Gen. Tretyak), Gen. Strogov. Strogov: "You s......., I'll lock you up in the guard house. Why don't you pick up the phone?" Titovnin: "Comrade General, everyone was busy here." Strogov: "You have nothing there to be busy with, busy. What kind of nonsense is that? So where is Kornukov?" Titovnin: "Kornukov is here." Strogov: "Put him on the phone." Titovnin: "One moment. He is reporting to Kamenski [Commander, Far East Military District Air Defense Forces], Comrade General." Strogov: "So what you need to do now. Contact these (...expletives), these sailors, these what do you {...expletives)?" Titovnin: "Border Guards?" Strogov: "Huh?" Titovnin: "Border Guards?" Strogov: "Well, the civilian sailors." Titovnin: "Understood" Strogov: "The border guards. What ships do we now have near Moneron Island, if they are civilians, send [them] there immediately." Titovnin: "Understood, Comrade General."
1856	Japanese Search and Rescue ordered begun "At 18:56 hours, thirty minutes after KE 007's estimated time over NOKKA and after repeated attempts to re-establish communication had failed, Tokyo ACC [Air Control Center] notified several ATS [Air Traffic Service] units and military units via direct-speech links, of its inability to establish radio contact with KE 007, and requested them to conduct a communication search."

Popular culture

• Two television movies were produced about the incident; both films were produced before the fall of the Soviet Union allowed access to archives:
  • Shootdown (1988), starring Angela Lansbury, John Cullum, and Kyle Secor, was based on the book of the same title by R.W. Johnson, about the efforts of Nan Moore (Lansbury), the mother of a passenger, to get answers from the US and Russian governments.
  • The British Granada Television documentary drama Coded Hostile, screened on 7 September 1989, detailed the US military and governmental investigation, highlighting the likely confusion of Flight 007 with the USAF RC-135 in the context of routine US SIGINT/COMINT missions in the area. Written by Brian Phelan and directed by David Darlow, it starred Michael Murphy, Michael Moriarty, and Chris Sarandon. It was screened by HBO in the United States under the title Tailspin - Behind the Korean Airliner Tragedy on 20 August 1989. An updated version of Coded Hostile was screened in the UK on 31 August 1993, incorporating details of the 1992 UN investigation.
• A documentary from Unsolved History, a program of Discovery Channel, featured this incident.
• The book The Zero Option, by David Rollins, is based on the mystery of Korean Airlines Flight 007.

See also

• Cold War
• History of the Soviet Union
• Korean Air Lines Flight 902
• List of airliner shootdown incidents
• List of Korea-related topics
• List of notable decompression accidents and incidents
• Shootdown

Notes

Footnotes

1. KAL 007 was used by air traffic control, while the public flight booking system used KE 007
2. The Sea of Japan is referred to in North Korea as the "Korea East Sea" and in South Korea as the "East Sea". See Sea of Japan naming dispute for more.
3. Young & Launer, pp. xiii,47
4. Pearson, p. 145
5. Congressional Record, Sept. 20, 1983,pp. S12462-S12464
6. Soviet news magazine, Izvestia #228, October 16, 1992
7. Kilroy
8. 3 crew, 20 cabin crew and 6 deadheading crew (ICAO 93, Sect. 1.3, p. 6)
9. Johnson, p. 6
10. Doerner, p. 5
11. Allardyce and Gollin, August 2007, pg51
12. Doerner, pg4
13. Photos of passengers at Airliners.net
14. ICAO 1983, appendix C, p. 2.
15. Rosenthal, pg70
16. Daniloff, p. 304
17. Milde, p53
18. Pearson (1987), pg40
19. Kleiner, Korea, a Century of Change
20. ICAO, 1993, p15, Section 2.8.1
21. Johnson, p. 16
22. Pearson, pp. 38–39
23. Hersh, pp. 199-213
24. Hersh, pp. 199-213
25. KAL 007 Cover-Up. David Pearson, Summit Books, N.Y., Pg. 277, point 10
26. An aircraft HSI generally has an image of a plane directly above the Horizontal Situation Indicator’s needle when the aircraft is on course. A needle pointing to the left or to the right of the image would indicate that the plane is deviated left or right of the course. KAL 007’s HSI’s needle would have been pegged all the way to the right (North). The ICAO expanded on the HSI’s capability of showing course deviation. Though the HSI was primarily designed to show the aircraft’s situation with regard to the horizon, the 747’s HSI contained an indicator to register deviation from plotted course. “Indications [of being on course] available to the crew would have been a reducing or zero track bar displacement with the HSI display set to INS and a similar reducing or zero cross track error on the CDUs [consoles]. There would have been a similar effect with the VOR track displacement…”—ICAO report 1993, p. 42, sect. 2.4.4.
27. Pearson, p. 40
28. Pearson, pp. 40
29. KAL 007: Cover-Up, David Pearson, Summit Books, 1987, pg. 277, point 8.
30. KAL 007’s two Bendix RDR-IF radars had a maximum range of with a 180° scan capability. ICAO 1983, p. 14, section 1.6.4.1
31. ICAO '93, pg. 45,2.9.1
32. ICAO '93, pg. 45, 2.9.1.
33. ICAO 1983, section 1.7.1., p. 9.
34. ICAO 1983, p. 45. Section 2.9.1.
35. Johnson, p. 55
36. Pry, p. 20
37. Fischer, A Cold War Conundrum: The 1983 Soviet War Scare
38. Schultz, p. 367
39. Degani, 2001
40. CBS' "60 Minutes" interview, Jan. 3, 1983
41. Rescue 007: Kamenski Interview
42. Illesh, The Mystery of the KAL-007
43. Maier, KAL 007 Mystery
44. Witkin, Soviet Pilot Insists Downed Korean Jet Was Spy Plane
45. Gordon, Ex-Soviet Pilot Still Insists KAL 007 Was Spying
46. Izvestia, 1991.
47. ICAO '93, p. 55
48. ICAO '93, p. 54
49. ICAO'93, Information Paper No. 1. p. 132,
50. ICAO '93, sect. 3.38, p. 61
51. "The last plotted radar position of the target was 18:35 hours at 5,000 meters." (ICAO '93, p. 53, para. 2.15.8)
52. Johnson, p. 30
53. Oberg, KAL 007: The Real Story
54. KAL 007:Cover-Up, David Pearson, Summit Press, N.Y., 1987,pg.122
55. ICAO, '93, 1.2.1, pg. 5
56. Daniloff, p. 300
57. Norris and Wagner, Boeing
58. ICAO '93, p39
59. ICAO '93, Information Paper 1, p. 93
60. Isaacson et al., 1983
61. ICAO, '93, Information Paper No. 1., pp. 95–96
62. Brun, pp. 143–44.
63. Kantakov and Shevchenko, In situ observations of Tsushima and West Sakhalin currents near La Perouse (Soya) Strait
64. Photo Mary Jane Hendrie
65. Pearson, p. 235
66. Izvestia, May 28, 1991, p. 8
67. ICAO '93, Sect. 1.12.4
68. After Action Report (Department of the Navy, Commander, Surface Combat Force Seventh Fleet. CTF75/N32:kpm,4730,Ser 011, 15 November,1983
69. USS Sterett Association
70. Winkler, p. 47
71. Commander of Task Force 71 of U.S. 7th Fleet, stated in his After Action Report (Department of the Navy, Commander, Surface Combat Force Seventh Fleet. CTF75/N32:kpm,4730,Ser 011, 15 November,1983)
72. ICAO Report, p. 28
73. After Action Report (Department of the Navy, Commander, Surface Combat Force Seventh Fleet. CTF75/N32:kpm,4730,Ser 011, 15 November,1983)
74. Johnson, pp. 117–121
75. Johnson, R. W. "Shootdown: The verdict on KAL 007
76. Daniloff, p. 294
77. Oberdorfer, p. 51
78. Ball, pp. 42–46
79. Richelson, p. 385
80. The Current Digest of the Soviet Press
81. Luck, Mixed Messages: American Politics and International Organization, 1919–1999, p. 64
82. Johnson, p. 110
83. Sputnik, The Truth and Lies about the South Korean Airliner
84. Pearson, p. 127
85. Johnson, p. 227
86. Johnson, p. 231
87. Johnson, p. 232
88. Appendix F, ICAO 83
89. Izvestia #228, October 16, 1992
90. May 7, 1991, p. 6
91. Merrills, p. 61
92. Pearson, p. 309
93. U.S. District Court, District of Columbia, In re: Korean Airlines disaster of Sept. 1, 1983, 28 February 1985
94. The New York Times, Jan. 7, 1991
95. Charles, p. 16
96. Pry, pp. 27–32
97. These memos were published in the Soviet news magazine, Izvestia #228, October 16, 1992, shortly after being made public by Yeltsin.
98. Daniloff, p. 303
99. Andrew, p. 60
100. Conclusions by the Group of Experts of the Defense Ministry, KGB of the U.S.S.R. and Ministry of Aerospace Industry, Head of the Group Lieutenant-General of Aviation Makarov Staff of the Group Lieutenant-General Engineer Tichomirov Major-General Engineer Didenko Major -General of Aviation Stepanov Major -General of Aviation Kovtun Corresponding Member of Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R. Fedosov 28 November 1983
101. Ross, East Asia in Transition: Toward a New Regional Order
102. For illustration only—KAL 007 did not necessarily use this type of recorder
103. ICAO '93, Information Paper No. 1, pp. 48–208
104. ICAO Report, 1993, p. 30, paragraph 1.14.3.5.4
105. United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit Nos. 907, 1057 August Term, 1994 (Argued: April 5, 1995 Decided: July 12, 1995, Docket Nos. 94-7208, 94-7218
106. Knight, p. 381
107. Pry, p. 31
108. Pearson, p.17
109. Young, p. 137
110. Johnson, p. 175
111. Knight, pp. 382-383
112. Johnson, pp. 230–237
113. Time, 1984-12-03
114. Allardyce & Gollin, 2007
115. Allardyce & Gollin, October, 2007, pp 52–56.
116. Pearson, p. 47
117. Pearson, p. 305
118. Ephraimson, Korean Bribe Rekindles Flight 007 Issues
119. rescue007 book
120. Burnett, p. 156
121. Pearson, p. 256
122. Blacker, p. 308
123. Johnson, p. 75
124. Baltimore Sun (1983-09-15) via Johnson, p. 60
125. These radars had been used in 1968 to alert Seaboard World Airlines Flight 253 in a similar situation.
126. Taubman, Keeping the Air Lanes Free: Lessons of a Horror
127. Pellerin, United States Updates Global Positioning System Technology: New GPS satellite ushers in a range of future improvements
128. http://www.annenberg.northwestern.edu/pubs/usfa/
129. Flight 007: The rest of the story, Washington Post, September 1, 1996.
130. Flight 007: The rest of the story, Washington Post, september 1, 1996.
131. Discovery Channel, episode "Unsolved History, KAL 007"
132. http://www.rescue007.org/kaminski.htm
133. These intercepts did not include Soviet ground transmissions, only those of the high-flying aircraft.
134. ICAO, '93
135. Johnson, p. 117
136. ICAO, '83
137. Johnson, p. 9
138. Photos of Kornukov
139. ICAO '93, Information Paper No.1, p. 101
140. ICAO '93, Transcript of Communications, p. 62
141. Johnson, p. 25
142. ICAO Report, Appendix D, page D-3
143. ICAO '93, Information Paper 1., p. 130
144. ICAO ;93, Information paper No. 1, p. 88
145. ICAO '93. Information Pages 1. pp. 132–133
146. ICAO '93, Information Paper No. 1., p. 133
147. ICAO Report, Appendix D, pp. D-3 and D-4
148. Secretary of State George Shultz, press briefing on the morning of September 1, 1983
149. ICAO '93, Information Paper No. 1, p. 156
150. ICAO '93, p. 53, para. 2.15.8
151. ICAO, 1993, Information Paper No. 1, p. 136.
152. Photo of Tretyak
153. ICAO'93, Information Papaer 1., p. 93
154. ICAO '93, Information Paper 1., pp. 95–96
155. ICAO '93, sect. 1.11.1, p. 16

References

Books

• {{cite book |url=http://books.google.com/books?id=YqaYJ3R0nKQC |title=International Air Law and ICAO |author=Milde, Michael |isbn=9077596542 |publisher=Eleven International Publishing |year=2008} }}

Journals

Online sources

• Wilkes, Jr., Donald E. "The Death Flight of Larry McDonald." Flagpole Magazine, p. 7 (September 3, 2003).

Further reading

External links

• Pre-shootdown photos of the aircraft, Airliners.net
• Bickel v. Korean Air Lines
• Hollie v. Korean Air Lines
• International Committee for the Rescue of KAL 007 Survivors
• KAL Flight 007 25 years on, The First Post
• USS Sterett: Photos and first-person account of US-Soviet naval confrontation
• USCGC Munro and the Korean Airliner (KAL 007)
• "A Tale of Two Airplanes" by Kingdon R. "King" Hawes, Lt Col, USAF (Ret.)