Posted on 07/11/2013 4:26:42 PM PDT by 1066AD
An Aeroflot plane en route from Moscow to Havana has deviated from its course, FlightAware live flight tracking indicates. The news has sparked online speculation that NSA leaker Edward Snowden may be aboard the aircraft.
However upon arrival in the Cuban capital, crew members told reporters that Snowden was not on board the flight.
Aeroflot flight 150 to Havana took off from Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport at 14:10 pm local time (10:10 GMT) on Thursday and landed around 22:30 GMT. Whistleblower Edward Snowden has been holed up in the airport for the past two weeks.
The flight route usually passes over Scandinavia and across Greenland before turning south over Canada and the United States. However, this time the flight headed west across Europe before continuing its path over the Atlantic Ocean.
The detour has spawned speculation in the media and on Twitter that Snowden may be aboard the plane and that that the plane may be trying to avoid entering US airspace. Snowden is wanted in the US on charges of espionage for revealing secret NSA surveillance programs.
Under Russian law, air carriers are banned from sharing flight passenger data to third parties, Aeroflot spokesman Andrey Sogrin told RT.
Referring to the flight detour, Sogrin said that “it is difficult to explain now” what exactly was behind the decision, but added that weather conditions or an issue with the flight schedule could be behind the move. In other words, if a flight is delayed, its route is sometimes changed in order to catch up with its expected landing time.
However, Thursday’s flight took off only five minutes later than scheduled, according to the Sheremetyevo airport website.
That hasn’t updated in a while. The article got updated while I was posting it, says it’s landed and crew saying Snowden not aboard, we’ll see !
I would expect the crew to deny it either way.
Should be landing about now....
So would I.
I agree.
Especially if Putin called them on a conference call on the plane before boarding and advised them not to talk. Ever.
I would suspect all Latin American flights from across Atlantic will head due north to a great circle and then come downs via mid-Atlantic until past Cuba, avoiding hostile USA airspace.
Snowden should get married to a Russian, dump all his files to the FSO or KGB or what ever they are now—give some to welileaks. settle down, learn Russian and live the rest of his days in Moscow or St. Petersburg. Maybe raise a family and get a simple job until Obama is out of power (if that day ever comes). At least he would be safe there as a Russian Citizen.
Any conservative American would be safer as a Russian citizen.
Trial run perhaps?
I know where he is.
Iceland? Used Venezuelan passport to get there?
It just didn’t look like a significant deviation on that track.
Look further down the article to the last graphic, titled “The usual route for Aeroflot 150 from Moscow to Havana”.
Huge difference.
If I knew how to photoshop I’d make Snowden’s face a little darker and put a mustache, serape and sombrero on him.
Here are the predetermined routes for today. Don’t know how to post the image.
http://www.turbulenceforecast.com/atlantic_westbound_tracks.php
Nothing out of the ordinary. Speculation from the writer is just plain dumb as far as the flight plan.
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