One-in-three blame Russia for Smolensk disaster

photo - archive/PAP/Pawel supernak

According to a survey marking the second anniversary of the disaster by TNS OBOP, 18 percent believe that the crash, which killed 96 in western Russia two years ago today, was an attack of Poland's head of state.

The most popular explanation for the disaster however is “errors by the Russian air controllers,” with 32 percent putting the blame on staff at the Smolensk airport control towers.

The official Russian investigation put most of the blame on “pilot error”, while the Polish investigation found human error, including mistakes made by Russian air traffic control, to be responsible for the disaster that killed President Lech Kaczynski, First Lady Maria and many of Poland's top military and opposition politicians.

Respondents in the new survey were allowed to give more than one answer, and the second most widely chosen explanation was “pilot error”, as evidenced by 28 percent of those surveyed.

Some 27 percent cited “errors made by Polish officials in the organisation of the flight,” while 22 percent blamed “pressure put on the pilots to land by their superiors.”

Just 13 percent stated that a “malfunction of the plane” caused the crash, while 16 percent said that it was “hard to say” what the true causes were.

In a parallel survey by TNS OBOP, 40 percent of those surveyed said that the Smolensk disaster was the most important event in recent Polish history.

However, 83 percent chose the death of Polish pontiff Pope John Paul II, 57 percent Poland's accession to the European Union and 45 percent the collapse of the communist system and the subsequent free elections. Some 9 percent chose Poland's participation in the Iraq war.

The surveys were conducted for the Gazeta Wyborcza daily from a sample of 500. (nh/pg)