Norwegian national TV, NRK, disclosed new information about radar plots from the Norwegian radar station in Honningsvåg.
The radar plots were classified for a long period, but pressure from the Norwegian parlament, Stortinget, resulted in a release of the plots in 1997. Standard operations procedure was to avoid logging of allied intelligence flights in the easter parts of Finmark, close to the russian border.
Several contacts in the plots from the Honningsvåg radar was classified as “Zoombie”-contacts (Unknown). One contact was flying over the Kola peninsula, while another was 200 nm east of the Widerøe crash site. NRK have recently found declassified information indicating that the contact 200 nm east of the Widerøe crash site was in fact a RC-135W from Mildenhall, while the contact flying over the Kola Peninsula was a SR-71, also from Mildenhall.
If this information are correct, an intelligence gathering mission was taken place in the area.
None of the information above has ever been published by the previous 2 Mehamn inquiry commissions.
The question about the 2-ship Harriers flying in the area of the accident has not been solved. But given the secrecy around the above mentioned military flights in the area, a low-level probing flight towards the russian border does not seem unlikely.
The Norwegian military intelligence have confirmed that flights of this type was taking place the same week, but were unable to confirm dates.
http://www.nrk.no/programmer/tv/brennpunkt/4242522.html
For scandinavian readers:
http://www.nrk.no/programmer/tv/brennpunkt/4241535.html
http://www.nrk.no/programmer/tv/brennpunkt/4245870.html
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