Five seconds played fatal role in Polish president's death

14 May, 2010 16:16 / Updated 4 years ago

The passengers on President Kaczynksi’s plane, which crashed on April 10, could have been saved if the pilot had moved the aircraft upwards 5 seconds earlier, according to a Polish newspaper.

That’s according to the data from the plane’s flight recorders, which the Dziennik Gazeta Prawna newspaper published on Friday.

The revelations are from a Polish report released after the black boxes were fully decoded.

The report suggests that when the pilot realized it was too late to climb, he decided to crash land, losing control of the plane when the wing hit a tree.

It also claims that mobile phones could have negatively influenced the aircraft's systems, as they were not switched off.

Last month's crash near Smolensk in western Russia killed all 96 people on board.

Read also – Russian Experts Reject Conspiracy Theory against Lech Kaczynski