Scores feared dead in Russian aircraft crash
A Russian passenger aircraft carrying 71 people crashed outside Moscow on Sunday after taking off from the capital’s Domodedovo airport, officials and local media said.
The Antonov An-148 aircraft operated by the domestic Saratov Airlines was flying to Orsk, a city in the Urals, and crashed in the Ramensky district on the outskirts of Moscow. Russian news agencies reported 65 passengers and six crew were on board and all were feared dead. News agencies reported that witnesses in the village of Argunovo saw a burning aircraft falling from the sky. A source from Russia’s emergency services said the 71 people on board “had no chance” of survival.
“The president offers his profound condolences to those who lost their relatives in the crash,” President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
State television aired a video of the crash site, showing parts of the wreckage in the snow.
Russia has seen record high snowfalls in recent days and visibility was reportedly poor. The Russian-made aircraft was seven years old and bought by Saratov Airlines from another Russian airline a year ago.
Russian media reported that the emergency services were unable to reach the crash site by road and that rescue workers walked to the scene on foot.
Emergency services said more than 150 rescue workers were deployed to the site.
A source at Domodedovo, Moscow’s second largest airport, told agencies that the aircraft disappeared from radars within two minutes of take off.
The Russian transport minister was on his way to the crash site, agencies reported. The transport ministry said several causes for the crash are being considered, including weather conditions and human error.
Prosecutors opened an investigation into Saratov Airlines after the crash. Russia’s investigative committee will consider all possible causes for the crash, RIA Novosti news agency reported.
In December 2016, a military plane carrying Russia’s famed Red Army Choir crashed after taking off from Sochi, killing all 92 people on board. In March 2016, all 62 passengers died when a FlyDubai jet crashed during an aborted landing at Rostov-on-Don airport.