WEBVTT - Thinking Sideways: Death of Samora Machel 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:02.880 Thinking Sideways is not brought to you by else who 0:00:02.920 --> 0:00:06.240 Steell sucks to make dresses. Instead is supported by the 0:00:06.280 --> 0:00:10.000 generous contributions of people like you, our listeners on Patreon. 0:00:10.560 --> 0:00:13.880 Visit patreon dot com slash thinking sideways to learn more 0:00:17.000 --> 0:00:29.240 Thinking Sideways. I don't understand you stories of things we 0:00:29.320 --> 0:00:35.040 simply don't know the answer too. Hey everybody, and welcome 0:00:35.080 --> 0:00:38.920 to another episode of Thinking Sideways. I am Steve, of course, 0:00:39.000 --> 0:00:43.400 as always, joined by Devin and Joe, and this week 0:00:43.520 --> 0:00:47.320 we're going to talk about a mystery. Of course, because 0:00:47.360 --> 0:00:50.279 by the time this episode comes out, there will be 0:00:50.360 --> 0:00:53.040 some presidential stuff going on. So I figured we'd talk 0:00:53.080 --> 0:00:55.280 about a president who happens to be in a different 0:00:55.280 --> 0:01:00.440 country ex President and a dead president prime minister president. 0:01:00.720 --> 0:01:03.440 You know, he's always referred to as president most of 0:01:03.480 --> 0:01:05.200 the time, so I'm gonna call him a president. Okay, 0:01:05.200 --> 0:01:09.479 so not the guy who swam away from wait, from 0:01:09.520 --> 0:01:12.800 the ocean. He was trying to get away from that ocean. 0:01:13.319 --> 0:01:15.679 It caught up. Now this week we're going to talk 0:01:15.760 --> 0:01:20.720 about the death of Mozambican President Samara Michelle, who died 0:01:20.800 --> 0:01:24.040 along with thirty three other people when the presidential plane 0:01:24.280 --> 0:01:27.640 which was a tuple of t U one three four 0:01:28.000 --> 0:01:32.440 A three crashed into a South African hillside on October nine, 0:01:33.600 --> 0:01:37.200 six um and it's believed by many people to have 0:01:37.319 --> 0:01:42.080 been an assassination, which was executed by intentionally crashing the plane. 0:01:42.560 --> 0:01:46.920 President at all. Before we get into the story, I 0:01:46.959 --> 0:01:49.120 do want to say that this is a listener suggestion. 0:01:49.440 --> 0:01:52.720 This is an ash story. Oh yeah, we haven't done 0:01:52.720 --> 0:01:54.440 a way Ashes stories in a long time. You haven't. 0:01:54.480 --> 0:01:57.320 And we haven't even gotten through half of his suggestion. 0:01:57.720 --> 0:01:59.640 I know. I didn't even intend. I didn't realize this 0:01:59.680 --> 0:02:02.720 was an suggestion until I got to it. And by 0:02:02.760 --> 0:02:11.040 the way, it's another suggestion. We're like through the first thirty. No, 0:02:11.160 --> 0:02:14.160 we love it ash um. Okay, So before we get 0:02:14.200 --> 0:02:16.840 into the story the crash, we do need to cover 0:02:17.040 --> 0:02:21.160 some background information on both Michelle as well as some 0:02:21.280 --> 0:02:25.200 other people and the area, because there was a bunch 0:02:25.440 --> 0:02:28.799 of turmoil in the region and that plays in it 0:02:28.840 --> 0:02:32.320 plays into the story. So first, let's start with the 0:02:32.360 --> 0:02:36.240 country of Mozambique, which is where some more Michelle was 0:02:36.280 --> 0:02:38.680 the president of Bob Dylan wrote a song about it. 0:02:38.880 --> 0:02:41.440 Did he really came out in the seventies, I think 0:02:41.480 --> 0:02:44.200 it was right after the decolonization and it was taken 0:02:44.200 --> 0:02:47.160 over by Marxist. Okay, because for a second I was 0:02:47.200 --> 0:02:49.160 thinking you were talking about there was a time where 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:53.720 Bob Marley had gone to the same region, but that 0:02:53.840 --> 0:02:56.880 was for another country which suddenly I don't have the 0:02:56.960 --> 0:02:58.600 name of, but I know it's further along in my 0:02:58.639 --> 0:03:02.000 script and I'll call it out when we get there. Um, Okay, 0:03:02.280 --> 0:03:06.080 if you're your geography, isn't that great with with South 0:03:06.120 --> 0:03:10.560 Africa and not the country, the area the southern part 0:03:10.600 --> 0:03:13.120 of Africa, Because that I was just had a moment 0:03:13.120 --> 0:03:18.119 where I was like, uh, you keep saying the beak 0:03:18.200 --> 0:03:19.960 is the country, but then you're saying in South Africa. 0:03:20.040 --> 0:03:23.800 Now I'm confused, So the southern region of Africa not 0:03:23.880 --> 0:03:26.920 South Africa. Correct. If you are familiar with or not 0:03:27.000 --> 0:03:29.160 familiar with it, you will look at a map and 0:03:29.240 --> 0:03:31.320 on the very bottom of the tip you will see 0:03:31.320 --> 0:03:35.080 the country of South Africa, and to the right of 0:03:35.120 --> 0:03:38.880 it on the coast is Mozambique, just directly to the 0:03:39.560 --> 0:03:45.920 north eastern side, and then there's a small country sandwich 0:03:45.960 --> 0:03:50.240 in between South Africa and Mozambique, which is called Swaziland. 0:03:50.920 --> 0:03:53.480 So that's where it is, and it's a Swazilands and 0:03:53.520 --> 0:03:57.640 its bitsy teeny tiny country. It kind of sandwiched. It's 0:03:57.720 --> 0:04:02.400 completely surrounded, its surround really landlocked. But yeah by those 0:04:02.440 --> 0:04:05.960 two countries, surrounded on three sides by South Africa and 0:04:06.120 --> 0:04:11.560 one side. Yeah. Yeah, for about four hundred years, Mozambique 0:04:11.640 --> 0:04:15.960 was Portuguese colony. And okay, so I got a safer second. 0:04:15.960 --> 0:04:18.920 I didn't really I knew Portugal head colonies. I didn't 0:04:19.000 --> 0:04:22.400 realize that it's still had colonies this far into the 0:04:22.440 --> 0:04:24.880 modern era for some reason. I mean, it's just a 0:04:24.920 --> 0:04:27.880 failing on my part for from a historical perspective apparently, 0:04:27.960 --> 0:04:29.880 but I was like, it's a Portuguese colony. I thought 0:04:29.880 --> 0:04:32.839 the Portuguese lost all our colonies like two hundred years ago. 0:04:33.000 --> 0:04:36.200 We know not everything, but I mean most places that 0:04:36.279 --> 0:04:39.600 had colonies still have colonies. Is that not accurate? My 0:04:40.040 --> 0:04:42.440 problem is is that I'm used to the British, who 0:04:42.600 --> 0:04:46.480 you know, returned all of their colonies primarily or most 0:04:46.560 --> 0:04:49.240 of them. They they don't have, but like two colonies anymore. 0:04:49.240 --> 0:04:51.799 It feels like and I know that's not the right number. 0:04:51.800 --> 0:04:54.040 Please don't send an email. I know too isn't the 0:04:54.080 --> 0:04:56.840 correct number, but there was a lot of turmoil in 0:04:56.920 --> 0:05:00.040 the last forty or fifty years and they have of 0:05:00.400 --> 0:05:03.960 those countries of all returned to their own governance. Yeah, 0:05:04.400 --> 0:05:07.120 in some fashion. Mostly most of the eclonization took place 0:05:07.120 --> 0:05:10.680 in the sixties, you know, a few held onto the seventies. Yeah. 0:05:11.279 --> 0:05:13.920 So anyway, this was a Portuguese colony, and as Joe 0:05:14.000 --> 0:05:16.640 was just talking about, in the sixties there was a 0:05:16.640 --> 0:05:21.800 lot of revolt against the Portuguese government. A grilla liberation 0:05:21.880 --> 0:05:27.360 group became very active starting around four and they were 0:05:27.440 --> 0:05:31.040 openly fighting the Portuguese government. The name of this group 0:05:31.279 --> 0:05:34.800 is the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique, which is 0:05:34.880 --> 0:05:38.680 kind of a mouthful. So thankfully everybody uses the acronym 0:05:38.760 --> 0:05:43.520 for LIMO, which is much easier to say, I do too. 0:05:43.960 --> 0:05:48.160 For LIMO fought against Portugal and made progress towards their 0:05:48.160 --> 0:05:51.440 goal of taking back the country, slowly but surely. One 0:05:51.480 --> 0:05:54.080 thing that really helped them is that they weren't the 0:05:54.120 --> 0:05:58.920 only colony struggling to do this, and there was actually 0:05:59.680 --> 0:06:04.360 liberally Asia movements in Angola, Portuguese Guinea and as as 0:06:04.400 --> 0:06:09.279 well as Mozambique, and in nineteen seventy four, after fighting 0:06:09.360 --> 0:06:14.360 wars on multiple fronts, there was a coup in Portugal 0:06:14.400 --> 0:06:17.640 which brought down the existing government and it was replaced 0:06:17.640 --> 0:06:21.159 by one that was totally willing to grant independence to 0:06:21.279 --> 0:06:25.000 the colonies. So the short version is Mozambique granted its 0:06:25.080 --> 0:06:29.280 independence in nineteen seventy five and for Limo, being the 0:06:29.320 --> 0:06:33.000 main force, took power. They became the governance at that time, 0:06:33.400 --> 0:06:35.880 and they quite quickly kicked out the two hundred and 0:06:35.880 --> 0:06:40.440 fifty thousand Portuguese citizens who were living in country, so 0:06:40.520 --> 0:06:44.400 they were literally taking everything back. A lot of African 0:06:44.400 --> 0:06:47.200 countries came to regret though, Uh there was there was 0:06:47.279 --> 0:06:50.279 positives and there was negatives. They there they did leave 0:06:50.640 --> 0:06:56.040 a pretty significant gap in terms of commerce, and uh 0:06:56.160 --> 0:06:58.800 there was some other areas that that really struggled because 0:06:58.839 --> 0:07:01.440 of it. Men in the they most of them have 0:07:02.120 --> 0:07:06.039 overcome that. It took them time. That's as it always does. Well, yeah, 0:07:06.040 --> 0:07:08.080 I mean they when you're a colony, right, all of 0:07:08.080 --> 0:07:13.560 your infrastructure is run. But the power colonizational power is 0:07:13.600 --> 0:07:18.280 that it's much easier to say yeah, um, so I mean, 0:07:18.520 --> 0:07:20.560 you know, as soon as they say you know what, 0:07:21.040 --> 0:07:23.160 you're cut off it's like people who know how to 0:07:23.240 --> 0:07:26.160 run the machinery. Well, it's you know, it's just like 0:07:26.480 --> 0:07:28.480 you know, being like a college kid and getting cut 0:07:28.520 --> 0:07:30.360 off from your parents all of a sudden, you're you 0:07:30.400 --> 0:07:32.960 have no idea what you're doing and you have to 0:07:33.040 --> 0:07:36.080 kind of fend for yourself. And it's a great analogy. 0:07:36.120 --> 0:07:38.480 It's really hard, That's exactly what it is. Yeah, But 0:07:38.560 --> 0:07:41.400 luckily most of these places have really at least kind 0:07:41.440 --> 0:07:44.400 of thing. They've grown up to use your college kid analogy. 0:07:44.440 --> 0:07:48.080 They've grown up. I have to say, the of all 0:07:48.080 --> 0:07:50.480 the all the countries out there that were forward colonies, 0:07:50.800 --> 0:07:52.960 the ones that are consistently doing the best are the 0:07:52.960 --> 0:07:55.800 ones that were colonized by the British. You know, I 0:07:55.800 --> 0:07:58.600 mean they really are. That's accurate. Actually, yes it is. 0:07:58.680 --> 0:08:01.840 And you look at like you know, Believes to India, 0:08:02.080 --> 0:08:07.119 to Canada, America to where is that that other place? 0:08:07.280 --> 0:08:10.640 That other place, yeah, that other place. Yeah. Even in Africa, 0:08:10.680 --> 0:08:12.760 the African countries that were colonized by the Brits, they're 0:08:12.760 --> 0:08:14.920 doing great. I wonder if there is a better access 0:08:14.920 --> 0:08:18.240 strategy that happened there. Uh, you know what, I don't know, 0:08:18.320 --> 0:08:19.920 And I think that's a long road for us to 0:08:20.000 --> 0:08:23.000 run down. Yeah, let's let's not go there. Let's let's 0:08:23.080 --> 0:08:26.000 keep focused on Mosbeak here because we're still talking about them. 0:08:26.120 --> 0:08:30.320 Yea boswa is the country got it, okay. So when 0:08:30.320 --> 0:08:34.160 for Limo came into power as the ruling government, they 0:08:34.200 --> 0:08:38.440 made the entire state a Marxist lenisis is that how 0:08:38.480 --> 0:08:41.640 you say that in Leninist thank you adding an extra 0:08:41.679 --> 0:08:46.880 ele in there? A Leninist Marxist Leninist political organization, a 0:08:47.280 --> 0:08:50.640 real formula for success. And so what that meant is 0:08:50.640 --> 0:08:54.280 that they set up a socialist state for its part. 0:08:54.440 --> 0:08:57.200 The Soviet unions obviously very happy about this. They have 0:08:57.240 --> 0:09:01.920 a new friend in town. But that didn't really didn't 0:09:01.920 --> 0:09:04.559 really make everybody else in the area happy. But we'll 0:09:04.600 --> 0:09:08.640 get into that in a second. Um Michelle Samoura Michelle, 0:09:08.720 --> 0:09:13.080 he was involved with for Limo from its beginnings. He 0:09:13.360 --> 0:09:17.440 very quickly rose to power through the organization, such so 0:09:17.600 --> 0:09:22.679 that in nineventy he was elected the leader of the organization. 0:09:23.400 --> 0:09:27.920 So in seventy five, when the Portuguese left and for 0:09:28.040 --> 0:09:33.000 Limo stepped into the government, choose he was kind of 0:09:33.040 --> 0:09:36.480 the natural, the natural person to take over, and he 0:09:36.520 --> 0:09:39.200 didn't it wasn't. There's a whole bunch of backstory here. 0:09:39.240 --> 0:09:42.240 He wasn't immediately just the number one guy, but we're 0:09:42.280 --> 0:09:44.560 just kind of shortening this to keep it simple. And 0:09:44.600 --> 0:09:47.959 the important thing he was president. He was president. And 0:09:48.000 --> 0:09:51.160 the other important thing to know is that almost immediately 0:09:51.400 --> 0:09:55.680 there was detractors who were not happy with him or 0:09:55.800 --> 0:10:00.920 for Limo, and a counter group or counter movement began, 0:10:01.600 --> 0:10:06.480 and that was the Mozambican National Resistance, which in the 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:09.760 beginning went by the acronym of just M and R. 0:10:09.920 --> 0:10:12.679 But later on they change their name. And this name 0:10:12.800 --> 0:10:15.400 is sort of recent, but we'll use it just because 0:10:15.440 --> 0:10:18.880 you're gonna see it most of the reading is Rhanamo 0:10:19.240 --> 0:10:24.160 and they opposed the communist based government and they actually 0:10:24.200 --> 0:10:27.840 began a civil war in nineteen seventy six. Yeah, I 0:10:27.840 --> 0:10:30.760 didn't do. So you can see country gets it's it's 0:10:30.760 --> 0:10:34.960 independence and then immediately goes to war with itself and 0:10:35.000 --> 0:10:37.680 the year later, like that's not a good thing. Listen, 0:10:37.880 --> 0:10:40.440 it's just the truncated version. They're just getting all of 0:10:40.520 --> 0:10:44.360 the crap out of the way. They're doing it fast, 0:10:44.760 --> 0:10:46.600 and then you know, they get that out of their 0:10:46.640 --> 0:10:49.800 system and then they have a great path to become 0:10:49.840 --> 0:10:52.439 a really productive, amazing country. There you go that that 0:10:52.520 --> 0:10:54.080 must have been the plan. I'm not sure. I didn't 0:10:54.080 --> 0:10:56.319 look up any stats on how productive and amazing they are. 0:10:57.080 --> 0:11:00.320 They actually there's been a lot of political changes in 0:11:00.520 --> 0:11:04.680 that country over the last forty years. But it's only 0:11:04.720 --> 0:11:07.040 been forty years, right, I mean they've only run their 0:11:07.080 --> 0:11:10.240 country for forty years, where when we fourty years out 0:11:10.280 --> 0:11:14.520 like not. Um, So let's keep going on. We're gonna 0:11:14.559 --> 0:11:16.719 talk a little bit more about the area. So we've 0:11:16.720 --> 0:11:20.720 got Michelle, he's now in power. We talked about the neighbors, 0:11:20.760 --> 0:11:25.520 which were South Africa and Rhodesia, which is modern day Zimbabwe. 0:11:25.800 --> 0:11:27.600 By the way, Rhodesia was the one that I was 0:11:27.640 --> 0:11:30.240 thinking of that Marley went to that he was he 0:11:30.280 --> 0:11:33.000 went there, did a big concert during their whole run. 0:11:33.160 --> 0:11:35.320 Also talked about Rhodesia when we talked about the Lake 0:11:35.360 --> 0:11:39.640 City Quiepels did we Yeah, the Rhodesian Army. You're right, 0:11:40.000 --> 0:11:43.880 we did stop coming together. But I think we have 0:11:43.880 --> 0:11:48.200 to go to Rhodesia. That's what is telling this country 0:11:48.200 --> 0:11:53.960 that doesn't exist anymore. Okay, So South Africa and Rhodesia, 0:11:54.040 --> 0:11:58.000 who were both under white control, do not like this 0:11:58.200 --> 0:12:02.720 country that is now a socialist state. They you know, 0:12:02.760 --> 0:12:08.439 they're not fans of communism, and they begin to funnel 0:12:08.559 --> 0:12:13.560 support and money and weapons and shelter to the folks 0:12:13.600 --> 0:12:18.520 that are involved in Renamo, And uh, yeah, that's that's 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:22.280 not very very cool to Michelle. He he doesn't like that. 0:12:22.400 --> 0:12:24.960 He actually has a lot of very stern words to 0:12:25.040 --> 0:12:28.160 say to both governments for that, but then again for 0:12:28.280 --> 0:12:33.360 his interfering their politics too. Yeah, because he was he 0:12:33.440 --> 0:12:36.000 was at the same time doing the same thing for 0:12:36.080 --> 0:12:39.120 the a n C, which is the African National Council, 0:12:39.640 --> 0:12:44.720 which eventually would take over when what's that African National 0:12:44.800 --> 0:12:49.040 Congress what did I call it? Council? Thank you over? 0:12:49.480 --> 0:12:51.440 But they would, you know, they would be the ones 0:12:51.480 --> 0:12:54.480 who would take over when the apartheid government in South 0:12:54.520 --> 0:12:58.959 Africa would eventually crumble several years later, more than several 0:12:59.679 --> 0:13:03.520 it's the along a long time. I meant several years 0:13:03.679 --> 0:13:07.160 after the death of Michelle. I apologize, I'm mixing my 0:13:07.240 --> 0:13:12.440 timeline there. That's my own fault. I think it was 0:13:12.480 --> 0:13:16.240 ninety four. So yeah, they did. They struggled against that 0:13:16.240 --> 0:13:19.040 for a long time. Okay, but let's jump ahead in time, 0:13:19.280 --> 0:13:21.400 We're gonna jump ahead. We've got a little bit of 0:13:21.400 --> 0:13:25.400 the backstory of the region. Let's jump to six. There 0:13:25.480 --> 0:13:27.520 was a meeting of the heads of state of several 0:13:27.520 --> 0:13:31.239 different African nations being held on the nineteenth of October 0:13:32.080 --> 0:13:37.360 six in Mambola, Zambia, and the goal was to, using 0:13:37.400 --> 0:13:42.200 air quotes here, encourage the dictator of Zaire to stop 0:13:42.240 --> 0:13:46.360 supporting the insurgent groups that were fighting in Angola at 0:13:46.400 --> 0:13:50.640 the time. As I understand it from the reading, Michelle's 0:13:50.760 --> 0:13:55.480 motivation to go there was also to help quote unquote 0:13:56.160 --> 0:14:01.199 encourage the other leaders there to stop support being Namo. Well, yeah, 0:14:01.240 --> 0:14:02.920 I mean that makes sense. Right. You go to a 0:14:02.960 --> 0:14:05.400 place and you say, hey, listen, yeah, I'll support you 0:14:05.400 --> 0:14:08.559 in this if you support me in that. Yeah. It's yeah, 0:14:08.559 --> 0:14:11.000 it's it's a given take. That's way this works. Yeah, 0:14:11.480 --> 0:14:15.280 that's what diplomacy is. I think it. Maybe diplomacy is 0:14:15.320 --> 0:14:20.600 basically threats. That's why you how you know you're an American? Okay, 0:14:20.920 --> 0:14:25.479 So Michelle, along with a bunch of his staffers and journalists, 0:14:25.960 --> 0:14:29.080 they flew to this meeting on the presidential plane, which, 0:14:29.120 --> 0:14:31.720 as I had said in the beginning, was a Tupa 0:14:31.840 --> 0:14:35.760 Lev TU one thirty four eight ash three, which is 0:14:35.760 --> 0:14:38.880 a Soviet design, And you don't say I do with 0:14:38.960 --> 0:14:42.200 a name like that, you do. It was a Soviet 0:14:42.240 --> 0:14:45.320 design and manufactured twin engine jet laner. The first thing 0:14:45.360 --> 0:14:47.480 I did when I heard it started going to the stories. 0:14:47.520 --> 0:14:49.720 I looked at the crash history of the Tupi Lev 0:14:50.160 --> 0:14:52.880 and actually that's not as bad as I thought would be. No, 0:14:53.160 --> 0:14:55.160 but it's not the safest plane in the world. It 0:14:55.240 --> 0:14:57.920 turns out to be not the worst either. This type 0:14:57.920 --> 0:15:00.560 of plane, though it had been around for at that 0:15:00.640 --> 0:15:04.840 time twenty years, and this particular plane had been in 0:15:04.880 --> 0:15:08.000 service with the government for six years. So it's a 0:15:08.040 --> 0:15:12.760 modern plane with the modern navigational equipment of the time. 0:15:13.240 --> 0:15:17.800 A telegraph did not, but it did have a fax machine. 0:15:18.400 --> 0:15:21.640 But something to note, uh this is I always found 0:15:21.640 --> 0:15:25.120 this little strange is that the crew were actually Russian. 0:15:25.760 --> 0:15:29.640 They were employed by the USSR and they operated the 0:15:29.640 --> 0:15:33.160 plane for the Mozambican government, which I just I don't know. 0:15:33.240 --> 0:15:35.360 Something about that seems a little odd to me. Well, 0:15:35.400 --> 0:15:38.640 they probably wanted the Russians to be changing the tapes 0:15:38.840 --> 0:15:42.480 and the bugging devices. Yeah, I mean, I guess they 0:15:42.560 --> 0:15:44.560 kind of yeah. I mean it a little bit makes 0:15:44.600 --> 0:15:46.800 sense to me. I can see it. It's a way 0:15:46.840 --> 0:15:49.240 to hear, we'll give you this plane, you know, for 0:15:49.320 --> 0:15:51.080 a discount, and then we'll give you a crew, and 0:15:51.200 --> 0:15:52.920 let's pay for the crew. I mean, you're leasing out 0:15:52.920 --> 0:15:54.640 the crew at that point. I get it, but it 0:15:54.640 --> 0:15:57.760 always just seemed a little odd to have to be 0:15:57.920 --> 0:15:59.920 leasing the crew, right, I mean, if they could just 0:16:00.000 --> 0:16:03.200 pay them directly to or the USSR they were they 0:16:03.200 --> 0:16:06.160 were Soviet employees. Yeah, I mean if the Soviet Union 0:16:06.240 --> 0:16:08.440 is really just trying to play that role of like 0:16:08.520 --> 0:16:12.000 big brother, like, yes, we will take you to encourage 0:16:12.680 --> 0:16:16.800 them to continue the Soviet way or a socialist way. 0:16:16.880 --> 0:16:18.280 So this is one of those things they do, is 0:16:18.360 --> 0:16:22.200 kind of a small gesture. And then also you know, 0:16:22.480 --> 0:16:25.680 get tons of intel and all that stuff because they're 0:16:25.680 --> 0:16:30.560 bugging the plane. As Jeff said, um so well, let's 0:16:30.720 --> 0:16:32.800 uh so enough about the crew. We're gonna go to 0:16:33.040 --> 0:16:35.760 We're going back to the date of the nineteenth of 0:16:35.800 --> 0:16:41.080 October of that six The meeting ended and because of 0:16:41.120 --> 0:16:45.520 Michelle had as the reading always says, he had an 0:16:45.600 --> 0:16:48.680 important meeting the next day, which it turned out was 0:16:48.720 --> 0:16:51.640 actually his wife's birthday, though a lot of people say 0:16:51.680 --> 0:16:54.720 that he also had some other quote unquote really important 0:16:54.760 --> 0:16:57.240 meetings that he had to attend. Let's be honest, you're 0:16:57.240 --> 0:17:00.160 a married man. Yeah, it's his wife's birthday. It's at 0:17:00.200 --> 0:17:03.560 a very important meeting to be there for. So well, 0:17:03.600 --> 0:17:06.480 she was with him, So they had they had gone 0:17:06.480 --> 0:17:10.040 to Umbala, and and she had gone with him, and 0:17:10.080 --> 0:17:13.000 so the rather than they've been offered to stay overnight, 0:17:13.480 --> 0:17:15.639 she probably didn't really want to. Yeah, they didn't. They 0:17:15.640 --> 0:17:17.080 didn't want to, so he said, no, we're going to 0:17:17.160 --> 0:17:24.080 go home today during the day though. Yeah. Yeah, So 0:17:24.359 --> 0:17:27.480 what happens here is, uh, they decided that they're gonna 0:17:27.520 --> 0:17:30.280 go ahead. They're gonna fly home to Maputo City, which 0:17:30.320 --> 0:17:34.640 is in the capital of Mozambique. And the plane leaves 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:38.000 at six forty at night, and it takes kind of 0:17:38.000 --> 0:17:43.359 this serpentine path, but it flies basically southeast towards Maputo, 0:17:43.880 --> 0:17:47.960 and the weather is clear and the flights estimated to 0:17:48.000 --> 0:17:52.400 take about three hours just just under Actually from here, 0:17:52.440 --> 0:17:55.600 we know what happened because of the fact that we 0:17:55.720 --> 0:17:59.600 what were recovered were the cockpit voice recorders, the CVR 0:18:00.160 --> 0:18:03.720 and the flight data recorder or the black boxes everybody 0:18:03.760 --> 0:18:05.359 likes to call them. And all those bugs at the 0:18:05.440 --> 0:18:07.240 Russians had placed and none of the bugs at the 0:18:07.280 --> 0:18:10.600 Russians had placed. Um, so we've got we've got all 0:18:10.640 --> 0:18:14.119 that data. At nine o'clock that night, the so this 0:18:14.200 --> 0:18:16.840 is they've obviously left and they're flying home. At nine 0:18:16.880 --> 0:18:21.040 o'clock that night, the crew contacted Maputo air traffic control 0:18:21.440 --> 0:18:24.000 to let them know that they're about forty minutes out. 0:18:24.920 --> 0:18:29.560 And then sixteen minutes later, by the way, it was 0:18:29.760 --> 0:18:31.800 not but it was a low it was a small 0:18:31.800 --> 0:18:33.959 moon if I remember right, and the moon had not 0:18:34.080 --> 0:18:39.240 yet risen. The moon wouldn't rise until shortly after the crash, 0:18:39.440 --> 0:18:43.000 like literally ten minutes after the crash, what moon there 0:18:43.119 --> 0:18:45.959 was would have come up, so that that would have 0:18:46.000 --> 0:18:48.800 maybe helped things here. Like I said, they contact the 0:18:49.280 --> 0:18:51.879 air traffic control, they say they're about forty minutes out. 0:18:52.000 --> 0:18:55.600 Sixteen minutes later they contact them again, uh, and let 0:18:55.640 --> 0:18:59.919 them know that they're ready to begin their descent. Yeah, 0:19:00.160 --> 0:19:03.720 thirty five minutes something like that. Yeah, it's at this 0:19:03.720 --> 0:19:06.679 point that I should explain something about how the plane 0:19:06.720 --> 0:19:09.960 was navigating to Maputo, and that is that they were 0:19:10.040 --> 0:19:14.680 using a vhs omnidirectional radio range finder, which we're from here. 0:19:14.680 --> 0:19:16.760 I'm going to call a v O R because that's 0:19:16.840 --> 0:19:20.760 much easier that actually ranged that just a beacon. It's 0:19:20.800 --> 0:19:23.280 a beacon, but that's that's part of the name in 0:19:23.320 --> 0:19:25.560 a nutshell with the v v O R is is 0:19:25.600 --> 0:19:28.960 it's a signal that's broadcast from a location that allows 0:19:29.080 --> 0:19:36.200 the pilot to determine their relation to that beacon. Yeah. 0:19:36.560 --> 0:19:40.800 And it's because there's a phase matched pair of signals 0:19:40.800 --> 0:19:43.959 that are being sent and through that match or mismatch, 0:19:44.240 --> 0:19:47.199 they can tell how far they are off in a 0:19:47.240 --> 0:19:52.520 three sixty degree circle. Is it like sonar um? No, 0:19:52.600 --> 0:19:56.359 not exactly. Here's how it works. Yeah, no, and believe me, 0:19:56.520 --> 0:19:58.320 I I got a hold of our experts. Thank you 0:19:58.359 --> 0:20:00.439 to all of our experts for their how up with this? 0:20:00.600 --> 0:20:04.000 I really hope this makes sense. Here's what happens is 0:20:04.400 --> 0:20:08.119 there is a signal I believe it's a pulsing signal 0:20:08.160 --> 0:20:12.120 that is constantly being sent out like a pin at 0:20:12.160 --> 0:20:14.720 the same time, and that's being sent out in all 0:20:14.760 --> 0:20:18.080 directions at the same time. At the same time, there 0:20:18.240 --> 0:20:21.440 is a second signal being sent out. And in the 0:20:21.480 --> 0:20:24.119 old days it used to be from a antenna that 0:20:24.200 --> 0:20:28.119 was actually a physically rotating antenna, and it would rotate 0:20:28.240 --> 0:20:30.720 twenty to thirty times a minute. But it is then 0:20:30.880 --> 0:20:35.720 also put in a directional fashion shooting out that signal 0:20:36.359 --> 0:20:39.760 so that they both start in line at true north. 0:20:40.280 --> 0:20:44.159 And so if it then rotates ninety degrees to the east, 0:20:44.440 --> 0:20:47.360 it's a quarter out of sinc due south, it's now 0:20:47.920 --> 0:20:51.320 it's now half out of sink and then three quarters 0:20:51.400 --> 0:20:55.080 and then they sink back up because the new rotation starts. 0:20:55.520 --> 0:20:57.840 I hope that makes sense. Basically, it's a spiral on 0:20:57.880 --> 0:21:01.240 top of another circle. Is how works. It allows them 0:21:01.240 --> 0:21:03.080 to figure out where they are in relation to it. 0:21:03.080 --> 0:21:06.600 It probably makes sense enough for it to matter. Yeah. 0:21:06.680 --> 0:21:08.879 And the other thing to remember is these are at 0:21:08.920 --> 0:21:11.560 the airports what they're heading for, and other airports have 0:21:11.640 --> 0:21:14.440 them also, but on different radio frequencies. Correct, they are 0:21:14.520 --> 0:21:17.080 not set on the same frequency. That would be confusing well. 0:21:17.119 --> 0:21:18.920 And and the thing is is that they also send 0:21:18.960 --> 0:21:21.040 out back in the day, they would send out a 0:21:21.080 --> 0:21:24.720 Morris code signal at the same time that would say 0:21:24.840 --> 0:21:28.880 essentially this is Maputu Airport, over and over and over 0:21:28.920 --> 0:21:30.639 and over, so that you didn't tune into it and 0:21:30.640 --> 0:21:32.399 start to fly to it and then realize you were 0:21:32.400 --> 0:21:34.800 going to the wrong airport. You could pick that code 0:21:34.880 --> 0:21:38.160 up right away, but would you use other airports signals 0:21:38.200 --> 0:21:41.720 to navigate off of, like knowing, hey, we're two hours 0:21:41.760 --> 0:21:45.080 into the flight, we should be passing this city. I 0:21:45.160 --> 0:21:48.639 under if I understand it correctly, Yes, okay. It is 0:21:48.680 --> 0:21:52.800 a method of navigation, not only to a specific destination, 0:21:52.840 --> 0:21:54.760 but to know where you are in relation to other 0:21:54.800 --> 0:21:57.639 places as you pass through their signal path. You can 0:21:57.640 --> 0:21:59.920 actually I just these compass and autopilot I think for 0:22:00.040 --> 0:22:02.040 most of it, and then just do corrections off when 0:22:02.040 --> 0:22:05.119 you pass an airport. Maybe, but I just wanted to 0:22:05.200 --> 0:22:06.600 make sure that that would be a thing that they 0:22:06.600 --> 0:22:11.280 would be switching between frequencies during the flight. They could be. Yes, Um, 0:22:11.280 --> 0:22:14.399 so the flight crew is using the Maputo v O 0:22:14.680 --> 0:22:17.840 r UM. That's how they're guiding into the airport because 0:22:17.880 --> 0:22:20.520 that's where they're going. I don't know if they actually 0:22:20.960 --> 0:22:26.280 picked it up yet. They they were only half hours, Joe. 0:22:26.359 --> 0:22:29.600 The vrs have a range of up to two miles, 0:22:30.320 --> 0:22:33.840 and they were forty minutes out, which made them about 0:22:34.359 --> 0:22:37.959 sixty miles or so away from the airport, so they 0:22:37.960 --> 0:22:40.800 were definitely in its range and they were definitely going 0:22:40.880 --> 0:22:43.480 to be picking it up there flying that slow. Well, 0:22:43.600 --> 0:22:46.640 they were, they were about to descend. You don't start 0:22:46.680 --> 0:22:50.119 to send two miles out, do you. I don't know. 0:22:51.640 --> 0:22:54.280 The point is they were, they were within it's it's 0:22:54.640 --> 0:22:57.520 It's envelope. They had definitely been picking it up, and 0:22:57.840 --> 0:23:00.400 they were they had tuned into it because that's where 0:23:00.400 --> 0:23:02.280 they were going to head to. They go ahead, and 0:23:02.400 --> 0:23:05.120 like I said, they tell air traffic control that they're 0:23:05.160 --> 0:23:08.600 going to start their descent. Air traffic control says, listen, 0:23:09.119 --> 0:23:12.160 go ahead and tell us when you're at when your 0:23:12.440 --> 0:23:15.399 altitude reaches three thousand feet or if you see our 0:23:15.480 --> 0:23:19.359 runway lights, contact us then and then we'll talk. Yeah, 0:23:19.440 --> 0:23:23.480 I know, it's really funny. And if we're talking clear night, yes, 0:23:23.600 --> 0:23:27.280 clear knight, not a cloudy night anything like that. The 0:23:27.320 --> 0:23:30.800