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of the Russian Federation. They also made available recordings and transcripts of the communications between the pilots of the intercepting fighter aircraft and their ground controllers as well as the communications between the command centres. The representatives of the United States made available certified copies and transcripts of the Anchorage ATC tapes, and the representatives of Japan made available the Tokyo ATC tape. In the course of the investigation, all practical steps were taken to confirm the authenticity of the communications tapes. A comprehensive assessment of the physical characteristics of the CVR and the DFDR tapes and the information recorded thereon was made to ensure that they contained authentic records. The material on the communications tapes and the CVR and DFDR tapes showed no evidence of contradiction with known information and correlated well with other sources of data.
There was no evidence to suggest that the crew of flight KE 007 was aware that their aircraft was flying to the north of its planned route or that they knew of the presence of the intercepting fighter aircraft.
The DFDR record established that flight KE 007 maintained a constant magnetic heading from soon after departure from Anchorage until the attack by the fighter aircraft. The maintenance of the constant magnetic heading was so accurate it could only have resulted from the autopilot controlling the aircraft. The CVR and the DFDR records also established that the aircraft did not sustain an extensive avionics or navigation systems failure or malfunction prior to the attack by the USSR fighter aircraft.
The evidence obtained supported the first hypothesis of those listed in the 1983 ICAO report, i.e. that the crew inadvertently flew virtually the entire flight on a constant magnetic heading. The maintenance of a constant magnetic heading and the resulting track deviation was due to the KE 007 crew's failure to note that the autopilot had either been left in heading mode or had been switched to INS when the aircraft was beyond the range (7.5 NM) for the INS to capture the desired track.
Concerning the interception and associated identification, signalling and communications the investigation found the following:
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Interceptions of KE 007 were attempted by USSR military aircraft over Kamchatka Peninsula and made in the vicinity of Sakhalin Island.
The USSR command centre personnel assumed that KE 007 was a United States RC-135 aircraft. KE 007's climb from FL 330 to FL 350 during the time of the interception over Sakhalin Island was interpreted as being an evasive action, thus further contributing to the USSR presumption that it was an RC-135 aircraft.
No attempt was made by the USSR to contact the crew of KE 007 by radio on the distress frequency 121.5 MHz or on any other VHF or HF frequency. However, the interceptor pilot was instructed by his ground control to attempt to attract the attention of the crew of the intruding aircraft by firing his aircraft's cannon and flashing its navigation lights. It was not possible to assess the distance of the interceptor aircraft from the intruder nor their relative positions when the interceptor's lights were flashed and the cannon fired.
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Private notes are available after approval.