KAL007’s last clear communication with Narita ATC prior to the missile being fired was at 16:20 UTC reporting its arrival at NIPPI. From that position KAL007 estimated its arrival at NOKKA at 18:26. NOKKA was the next compulsory waypoint to report and is 865Km from Niigata. Coincidently 18:26 was the exact time of the missile strike and was also a time listed on the flight plan by Chun.
Whilst KAL007 was erroneously reporting its position it must have been correct in terms of distance and time to next waypoint Niigata. Thus at 18:26:20 it must have been somewhere on an arc 865km from Niigata the same distance as NOKKA to Niigata.
This puts KAL007 at a closest possible distance of 136Km to the missile impact site location at 18:26:20. IACO states position of missile strike (46°46′27″N , 141°32′48″E). Since KAL007 could be anywhere on the arc it is quite possible it was even further from the incident. Since KAL007 cannot have been where and when the missile was fired, the Soviets obviously shot at something else and 007 met its demise somewhere else.
This is confirmed by the only Russian statements at the time. “The intruder escaped over the Sea of Japan” both in TASS and the UN on Sept 2. Mr. Ovinnkov stated: “It was natural that during the time the unidentified intruder plane was in USSR airspace, Soviet anti-air defence aircraft were ordered aloft which repeatedly tried to establish contacts with the plane using generally accepted signals and to take it to the nearest airfield in the territory of the Soviet Union; The intruder plane, however, ignored all this. Over the Sakhalin Island, a Soviet aircraft fired warning shots with tracer shells along the flying route of the plane. Soon after this the intruder plane left the limits of Soviet airspace and continued its flight towards the Sea of Japan. For about 10 minutes it was within the observation zone of radio location means, after which it could be observed no more.
At 18:27:02 (42 seconds after missile impact) reportedly KAL007’s last transmission but instead of a “mayday, mayday mayday” as would be expected after loosing 1/2 the left wing, KAL007’s transmission begins with a calm “Tokyo Radio, Korean Air Zero Zero Seven”. It appears this transmission was the start of its position report to Tokyo announcing its arrival at NOKKA. After Tokyo’s reply, Captain Chun pushed the transmit button but the cabin loudspeaker squawked squawked something unintelligible, followed by “repeat conditions”, and Chun stating “Blood bath, real bad”.
The Narita air traffic tape transcript also stops abruptly at 18:35:12 and restarts at 18:41:17 , then finishes at 18:42:22 There is no technical reason for this but it covers the critical period during KAL007’s disappearance from radar.
The same conclusion that KAL007 was not at the missile impact site at the time stated can be arrived at a different way.
After Bethel, the next radar controlled waypoint was Niigata. Only these two waypoints Air Traffic control could verify the position. Other way points weren’t controlled and solely relied on Pilot reporting position correctly. This means it was a logical place to re-enter the planned flight path*. * – it is also possible Captain Chun planed to re-enter the planned flight path at the next way point FIR but the same basic time and distance calculations would apply.
The flight was planned to arrive Niigata at 19:30 GMT (19:24???). The missile was fired at 18:26:20.
i.e. the missile was fired 1hr, 3minutes and 58 seconds prior to scheduled arrival at Niigata.
The Flight speed of a 747-200 is Mach 0.84 (893Km/hr). Top speed is Mach 0.92 990km/h
Weather conditions were as follows:-
Upper-level winds (at flight altitudes, e.g., around 250 hPa or 35,000 feet): Generally westerly from 260–290°, with speeds of 30–50 knots. Local maxima reached 50–55 knots in areas between 155°E and 145°E, including parts of Sakhalin and the Sea of Okhotsk. An area of weaker winds (215° at 15 knots) was reported nearby at 18:05 UTC August 31 by KAL007 itself.
In summary, there were head winds so above speeds would be lower by between 15-50 knots 28-93 km/hr. I.e. Cruise speed of 865-843km/hr, top speed 940-962km/hr
For a pilot, they would plan to arrive at their scheduled destination travelling at nominal cruise speed. Any ability to increase speed would be used to counter adverse wind conditions or fly around weather events (turbulence/storms etc).
KAL007 estimated arriving NOKKA at 18:26
At 16:26:02 (time of missile strike) KAL, to arrive at Niigata on time, had 1 hr, 3 min and 58 seconds to get there. KAL could travel 894km at normal cruise speed and reported winds.. This would put them 108km south of the missile strike location, safely in international waters. This is about 7 1/2 minutes ahead of whatever aircraft was fired upon.
Coincidently this is very close to how far NOKKA was from Niigata which is to be expected.
Note it is still possible for KAL to have travelled from missile attack location to Niigata but it would have to had to travel at its maximum speed and winds had to be very light. No pilot would plan for this, especially Captain Chun who was known as the human computer.