'SOMETHING EXPLODED...'

Russia accused of downing crash plane | Claim jet mistaken for a Ukrainian drone

- ANDY LINES

THE Azerbaijan Airlines jet which crashed killing 38 people may have been shot down by Russia, it has been claimed.

Experts said the plane - flying from Baku, Azerbaijan, to Grozny in the Russian republic of Chechnya on Christmas Day was mistaken for a Ukrainian drone and blown out of the sky by Vladimir Putin's military.

A surviving passenger told Russian TV the pilot had tried twice to land in dense fog over Grozny before "something exploded... some of the aircraft skin had blown out".

One theory suggested a PantsirS1 surface-to-air missile was aimed at the plane from Chechnya.