Russian investigators will give Poland another look at the wreckage of Lech Kaczyński's plane

Russia’s Federal Investigative Committee has approved a request by Polish officials to carry out another inspection of the wreckage of the Tu-154 plane that crashed outside Smolensk in 2010, killing then President Lech Kaczyński. The review of the plane’s structural debris will take place between September 3 and 7, conducted by specialists from Russia’s Main Forensics Directorate “in the presence of Polish officials.”

Why are we talking about an eight-year-old plane crash?

• In Poland, the 2010 Smolensk crash has grown more contentious over the years, straining the country’s historically complicated relationship with Russia. The Moscow-headquartered Interstate Aviation Committee ruled out a terrorist attack, explosion, or fire on board as the cause of the crash, attributing the incident to pilot error and bad weather conditions.
• Polish investigators initially agreed that Kaczyński’s pilots made mistakes, but they also placed some blame on the Russian air traffic controllers at Smolensk North Airport.
• In 2016, Poland reopened the investigation, exhuming the crash victims’ bodies. In March that year, National Defense Minister Antoni Macierewicz said a terrorist attack could have downed Kaczyński’s plane. In October 2017, Macierewicz said one of the plane’s flight recorders picked up the sound of an explosion.