UPDATE
I am prepared to acknowledge that, given the gate design, they could have passed through different gates in exact synchronicity and this may be a red herring. I am leaving this post up here as it is good to acknowledge mistakes. Please read my updated post Skripals – The Mystery Deepens
Russia has developed an astonishing new technology enabling its secret agents to occupy precisely the same space at precisely the same time.
These CCTV images released by Scotland yard today allegedly show Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov both occupying exactly the same space at Gatwick airport at precisely the same second. 16.22.43 on 2 March 2018. Note neither photo shows the other following less than a second behind.
There is no physically possible explanation for this. You can see ten yards behind each of them, and neither has anybody behind for at least ten yards. Yet they were both photographed in the same spot at the same second.
The only possible explanations are:
1) One of the two is travelling faster than Usain Bolt can sprint
2) Scotland Yard has issued doctored CCTV images/timeline.
I am going with the Met issuing doctored images.
UPDATE
A number of people have pointed out a third logical possibility, that the photographs are not of the same place and they are coming through different though completely identical entry channels. The problem with that is the extreme synchronicity. You can see from the photos that the channel(s) are enclosed and quite long, and they would have had to enter different entrances to the channels. So it is remarkable they were at exactly the same point at the same time. Especially as one of them appears to be holding (wheeled?) luggage and one has only a shoulder bag.
I have traveled through Gatwick many times but cannot call to mind precisely where they are. Can anybody pinpoint the precise place in the airport? Before or after passport control? Before or after baggage collection? Before or after customs? The only part of the airport this looks like to me is shortly after leaving the plane after the bridge, and before joining the main gangway to passport control – in which case passengers are not split into separated channels at the stage this was taken. I can’t recall any close corridors as long as this after passport control. But I am open to correction.
Please read my updated post Skripals – The Mystery Deepens
The 3rd option is correct. They were walking down two separate corridors. This is proven by superimposing one photo onto the other one. I’m happy to send you this evidence.
After you rotate and correct the perspective of one image to match the features of the other one (since it’s obviously two different cameras next to each other), you will see it’s the same corridor.
Show me how you did that please?
GRU? You’d at least expect a balaclava and the middle of the night.
Broad daylight when Sergei could be letting the cat out?
Crazy Russians.
The two mugshots look very similar too. Same background and lighting. They must be very close doing so much together. Where did the mugshots come from?
Russians have to get a visa to come to the UK. They would presumably have to attend a UK embassy/consulate in person and undergo a suitable grilling. The two are supposedly GRU. Were they known to be GRU when they applied for visas? If not, how were they identified as such? Casing out a joint usually takes a significant amount of time. Have the two been to the UK before? If so, when? There were two suspects reported on 6 August 2018 with the UK government poised to apply for an extradition request (even though it knew such a request would not be accepted). Why did it take so long to identify them given their details, arrival and departure times, etc would be known in early March?
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/aug/06/uk-poised-to-ask-russia-to-extradite-salisbury-attack-suspects
Maybe they were on a US or other Baltic country spy agency database?
Not knowing their real names makes the certainty around their status as GRU agents odd though.
Perhaps the giveaway was on the application form – when asked for occupation they wrote “GRU operative” but it must have taken investigators a while to pick up on this! I’m being ironic of course but, such is the incompetence of HMG, nothing would surprise me. Seriously though, as far as I am aware they have been declared to be GRU agents simply because that suits May’s narrative on this.
Yes Yonatan.
Long before you go through the home airport , the host airport knows exactly who you are. Probably from the moment you make your booking. The PM thinks by talking statesmanly in a Victorian building in Westminster she can pretend we are not living in a digital age of universal spying. They’re not going to allow a couple of GRU operatives to come to the UK at all.
They do seem to have improved the script-writing from the clunky statements we were given earlier. Which is good news for script-writers. I’m getting to retirement age as an electrician and I could use a few bob from GCHQ to supplement my pension. I have an English BA from Oxford. Where can I apply for the position of writing smooth believable tripe for domestic and international consumption from my desktop? And the proceeds baxed through on receipt of my signature on the official secrets act. High time I hit a gravy train from somewhere.
The tunnels are different places, this has been demonstrated… but anyway..
I don’t find anything that odd about these guys being here, it doesn’t really prove anything.
They no doubt keep tabs on people like Sergei, and Yulia’s visit would be enough of an excuse to pay a visit to see what she was up to.
This has been a day for the Empire to fight back.. But. If they could animate dinosaurs in Jurassic Park in 1993, what can they do now with digital imagery? These two are obviously more double agents from the leaky GRU which produced triple agent Sergei Skripal. Please, please, please don’t animate Mrs Thatcher from Mrs May. My system couldn’t take it. Can we have clips from before and after the photos so we can see these actors joking with the film crew?
We now know from the obvious and from comments that:
There are parallel channels at Gatwick.
The “pause” caption if real indicates video not still cameras.
The variation in colour balance suggests different cameras therefore different channels.
The pictures have been cropped – visually obvious but the metadata (for retrieval time probably and if it can be relied upon) gives slightly different image sizes, typical of manual cropping and about 5 hours apart.
I suggest that one still image was chosen and then when later the other camera was examined the second image was grabbed at exactly the same indicated and real time, revealing the second subject. He could have traveled through the gate at a marginally different time and been centered by the obviously different cropping and grabbing a frame up to a second difference in time.
We then have genuine pictures, but still nothing indicates these were servants of the Russian state rather than of independent criminal organisations or another state.
Yes.
“The variation in colour balance suggests different cameras therefore different channels.”
No, it doesn’t. White balance or what you are calling colour balance can be affected by a range of things. The most likely is simply a change in the light. The temperature of light changes constantly so that the same camera in the exact same place will, of course, give different results as a consequence of changing light.
If the images have been cropped then you’d be forced to conclude they had been tampered with. I don’t see how you could crop without affecting the timestamp. And if you cropped then added a timestamp later, that, by definition, means they are totally compromised and unreliable as they stand.
As I said, the different angles of the camera is consistent with the camera being moved in between shots. A few things could cause a camera to move and it isn’t uncommon for a stabilised camera to move or “creep” very slowly all by itself.
Everything I see suggests these photos were taken in the same place, by the same camera, but at different times.
Someone said earlier these were fish-eye lenses. More likely just very wide angle lenses, to be honest, as most CCTV cameras are wide angle. The bend you see in vertical lines is barrel distortion which all but the best wide angle lenses suffer from.
As for the movement, they may be remotely controllable which would explain the angles; known as PTZ or ‘pan-tilt zoom’ cameras.
‘Steve’, who posted above, is correct.
At Gatwick, after you go through customs, there is a final wide corridor at the end of which are multiple (3 or 4 IIRC) double-gated channels through which you need to pass in order to exit the secure, “airside” area of Arrivals.
They’re like an airlock – the first door opens, you step inside, and once you’re in, the first door closes and (hopefully!) the second door then opens which gives egress onto the main arrivals concourse, where your relatives or car pick-ups will be waiting, or you proceed to the car park/public transport/taxis etc.
It’s hardly a surprise that everyone passing through these ‘airlocks’ will be photographed via still or video CCTV camera, given the highly surveilled nature of airports these days, although I have never noticed cameras in these airlocks before.
As it happens, I will be flying into Gatwick S Terminal next week, and will make it a point to note the number of these parallel airlocks.
I might even carry out an experiment with my partner to see whether we can both pass through adjacent airlocks at the same time – crowds permitting!
But let me assure you that, having flown in and out of Gatwick numerous times in the last few years (it’s now my local airport), there are very definitely at least two, possibly three or even four, identically designed, parallel, narrow airlock-style passageways that lead out of the secure airside zone at Gatwick.
Whether or not these suspects are who the gov says they are is another matter, but I think this particular issue is a red herring.
The embarcation/ disembarcation finger ?
they look to me and are dressed (cheaply) like Ukrainians, a ticket to London costs way more than their sorry rags.
I see Ukrainians dressed like that every day
The corridors are narrow and there appears to be natural light coming from both sides. Most likely the photos are taken in jet bridges.
The perspective looks decidedly dodgy as if the corridor is narrowing behind the agent. And there is a strange unnatural seeming symmetry between right and left. If we gauge the width of the corridor from the agents’ shoulders it would appear to be about 750mm wide 800mm max. The building regulations would insist on at least 900mm width for any public space which presumably this is intended to be. The picture has been cobbled up by rank amateurs. I can hardly believe these obvioius photocollages have been released by the authorities as evidence. They obvious reckon this on not going to court as a defense lawyer would tear it to shreds
If one of the two Russians were to appear in the UK, wouldn’t it have to go trial?
What’s your source for the pictures?
They could have been doctored to add the timecode once released on the internet just to cause a conspiracy theory.
A conspiracy within a conspiracy?
Admiral Ackbar – “It’s A Trap!”
Ok this is a very poor conspiracy theory:
(a) a large majority of major airports have multiple one way exit lanes that look exactly the same
(b) if two people are approaching exit lanes walking side by side, there’s nothing suspicious about going in separate corridors. If anything, it would be more unnatural for one of them to slow down and go behind the other.
(c) if two people are approaching exit lanes at the same time, i.e. walking side by side, then go into separate corridors, its not beyond the realm of possibility they would be time stamped at the same time. Their pace isn’t going to significantly differ from one another in the space of 10 seconds unless there is some contributing factor e.g. hugely different statures
(c) … especially if they are the same height and build.
Video https://my.mixtape.moe/hwawbp.mp4
Align the two photographs using their digital timestamps, cross-impose the two images and you see that not only are the two males different but the walls and rails are different. This suggests the channels are different. As CCTV cameras in such confined mantrap channels are usually fixed the men therefore are likely in different channels altogether.
“…cross-impose the two images and you see that not only are the two males different but the walls and rails are different.”
I can’t see any difference in the walls or the railings. They look absolutely identical to me.
That’s because they are designed to the identical spec.
There are at least two, if not more, of these parallel airlock channels at Gatwick as you exit the secure airside zone at Arrivals. (See my post above).
Of course they’re identical, they perform the identical function – why would they be designed differently from each other?
The camera mounted above the final exit door is at a very slightly different pitch on each photo, but if they are gimbal mounted, there’s a good possibility that movement over time or just a variation in their original positioning by the installer, accounts for the slight disparity in viewing angle. Hardly suspicious!
I’m all up for some juicy conspiracy theories, but this one is a non-runner, IMO.
If the images originate from the same camera it should be possible to superimpose the one onto the other seeing that all object locations and angles align. Just from looking at them it seems this is not the case.
Other people here have aligned them in photoshop after allowing for shifti g and cropping
NEITHER is wearing shades. Therefore they cannot be either secret agents or celebrities.
Sane commentary:
https://twitter.com/Okavangomick/status/1037370320766816261
Sane questions:
https://off-guardian.org/2018/09/05/skripal-case-suspects-named-questions-raised/
Its the ramp between the airplane and gate. They are all the same.
No it’s not – they are the parallel ‘airlock’ style exit channels which you have to pass through in order to leave the secure airside zone at Gatwick Arrivals.
I pass through them every couple of months, though I can’t remember exactly how many there are – at least two, possibly 3 or even 4, will check next week on my next flight into LGW.
From a friend who flies a lot:
‘These corridors are in several locations. They’re anti-pass-back corridors – so anywhere you *don’t* want people to return up the corridor they just came – e.g. before entering passport control is a possibility or leaving the controlled part of the airport going into the public part – i.e. after passport control and after the collection of baggage; you pass through these sort of doors so they don’t need to employ someone to stop you coming in through the exit.
I suspect these sit between baggage claim and the public part of the airport but I don’t know for sure.
These are two corridors; side by side with two seperate entrances (as Mr Murray states “they would have to have done”) – completely parrallel.’
James B
This was a dastardly act of terrorism by a rogue nation with a despicable leader who has hijacked the Russian people.
How dare you deflate government lies with your mundane comments on Gatwick Airport, the place you blink and say:
” oh my God, you’ve brought me back to this shithole country again. When can I afford to get back abroad? “
Several different one-person entry channels? Haven’t visited an airport recently but that would seem an obvious explanation
Exit channels, but yes, that’s correct.
Doctor Who S11E11 “the impossible photo”
now that would be a nice episode
It’s hard to comprehend that people fall for this shit.
The Russians have managed to deflect the UK government from the true Russian assassins – the real Petrov and Boshirov.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DmU8fXUW0AIrhlF.jpg
Why is the top frame slightly is tilted to the left and the second photo more vertical. If the camera is stationary the camera would not move at all. There could be more than one camera along the ramp.
You can see the shot is not the same, the camera is in a different position from the other. Also, look bear the time, you can see in the bottom image a text box of some sort cut off.
It is interesting though.
Courtesy of Reuters Moscow correspondent Polina Ivanova’s Twitter feed
@polina__ivanova
Russia’s Fontanka newspaper has dug up some details from bios of #Skripal suspects
Ruslan Boshirov, it says, apparently born in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, in 1978; had a registered address on Moscow outskirts but neighbours said only elderly lady lives there
https://twitter.com/polina__ivanova/status/1037372844123009024
For what it’s worth.
Interestingly the BBC pictures on their website don’t show time code. Did they notice the mistake and removed them?
These two Russians are not GRU – They decided to take a trip to the Salisbury in the UK to have a look around Salisbury to see what all the fuss was about. These guys are being used by the British to try to make the false flag event real. Now what we hear is how it’s all going undercover, so that this fairy tale which is becoming totally ridiculous can be silently forgotten about other than to be used as a stick to beat the Russians with even though we still have not a shred of evidence the Russians had anything to do with this. Notice the big announcement was made on PM question time to divert from the appallingly bad job she is doing on Brexit.
Alexander Litvinenko’s widow slammed the govt for refusing calls for public inquiry into his death. The stated reason was International relations, but that seems odd because relations with Russia are rock bottom and were back then(2013).
“Last month Coroner Sir Robert Owen, who is in charge of the inquest – which has yet to take place more than six years after the 43-year-old spy died of polonium-210 poisoning – controversially indicated that the Government’s determination to keep many documents secret was making his task impossible. ”
She’s calling for the same over this incident.
Just goes to show how corrupt and underhand that the BBC and their media cohorts are. Nothing of real substance is reported with ANY integrity. No slice of honour in terms of factual news is recorded and reported to the viewing, listening or reading audience ! This country (ie UK) has been the subject of misinformation, subliminal simulation and outright lying propaganda led by the political elite along with the ‘nod’ from the rich ‘suits’ who “OWN” the country !