Shootdown of Flight 655
Locater map depicting Iran Air 655's origination point, destination and approximate shootdown location. (Air corridor not necessarily a direct path.)
The plane, an Airbus A300 (registered as EP-IBU), flown by 37-year-old Captain Mohsen Rezaian, a veteran pilot with 7,000 hours of flight time, left Bandar Abbas at 10:17 Iran time (UTC+03:30), 27 minutes after its scheduled departure time. It should have been a 28-minute flight. After takeoff, it was directed by the Bandar Abbas tower to turn on its transponder and proceed over the Persian Gulf. The flight was assigned routinely to commercial air corridor Amber 59, a 20-mile (32 km)-wide lane on a direct line to Dubai airport. The short distance made for a simple flight pattern: climb to 14,000 feet (4,300 m), cruise, and descend into Dubai. The airliner was transmitting the correct transponder "squawk" code typical of a civilian aircraft and maintained radio contact in English with appropriate air traffic control facilities.
Aegis screen displays in the combat information center on board Vincennes
On the morning of 3 July 1988, USS Vincennes was passing through the Strait of Hormuz returning from an escort duty.[2] A helicopter deployed from the cruiser reportedly received small arms fire from Iranian patrol vessels as it observed from high altitude. Vincennes moved to engage the Iranian vessels, in the course of which they all violated Omani waters and left after being challenged and ordered to leave by a Royal Navy of Oman warship.[21] Vincennes then pursued the Iranian gunboats, entering Iranian territorial waters to open fire. Two other US Navy ships, USS Sides and USS Elmer Montgomery, were nearby. Thus, Vincennes was in Iranian territorial waters at the time of the incident, as admitted by the U.S. government in legal briefs and publicly by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral William J. Crowe, on Nightline.[22][23] Admiral Crowe denied a U.S. government coverup of the incident and claimed that the cruiser's helicopter was over international waters initially, when the gunboats first fired upon it.[22][24]
The International Court of Justice case relating to the attack, "the Aerial Incident of July 3, 1988, (Islamic Republic of Iran v. United States of America)", was dropped on 22 February 1996 following settlement and reparations by the United States.[37]
Three years after the incident, Admiral Crowe admitted on American television show Nightline that Vincennes was inside Iranian territorial waters when it launched the missiles.[23] This contradicted earlier navy statements. The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) report of December 1988 placed USS Vincennes well inside Iran's territorial waters.[38]
Everyone should read this detailed report from all sides
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655
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