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From Russia Today:
According to the investigators, the official was in charge of flight operations at Yak Service, with control of the pilots' qualification being his direct responsibility.
"By putting the crew in the air Timofeev broke the rules of air transport operations. At the moment of the disaster, that crew wasn't entitled to fly," [Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir]*Markin stressed.*"Timofeev had allowed the captain to fly based on falsified documents, and the co-pilot hadn't finished his training on the Yak-42 plane and had no right to be in air."
From Sov Sport:"By putting the crew in the air Timofeev broke the rules of air transport operations. At the moment of the disaster, that crew wasn't entitled to fly," [Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir]*Markin stressed.*"Timofeev had allowed the captain to fly based on falsified documents, and the co-pilot hadn't finished his training on the Yak-42 plane and had no right to be in air."
Investigators are certain that the catastrophe could have been avoided if it wasn't for a number of violations committed by Timofeev, who was responsible for company's flight organization work. *According to an Markin [Prosecutor's Office representative], on the day of the crash the flight crew was supposed to attend re-education sessions for the permit to fly Yak-42 [aircraft], and not to fly.
The official report on the crash deemed it was a result of "pilot error", stating that the plane's break was applied during takeoff and also a banned medication was found in the blood of one of the pilots.*Yak Service went out of business soon after the crash after the company had their license revoked.
On Thursday, the re-built team was back on the ice for their opener in the 2012-13 KHL season*defeating Sibir 5-2.
With additional reporting by Dmitry Chesnokov
Follow Sean Leahy on Twitter at @Sean_Leahy