Difficulties in making required reports: Pilot and copilot could also have been aware of the aircraft's serious deviation because now, much more than 12 nautical miles off course, KAL 007 was too far off course for the pilots to make their required Very High Frequency (VHF) radio reports, and had to relay these reports via KAL Flight 015, just minutes behind and on course (KAL 007, increasingly off course, relied on KAL 015 three times to relay its reports to Anchorage Air Traffic Control).