71 DIE IN JET CRASH
Fiery horror after takeoff in Russia
At least three children and two young flight attendants are among 71 people who died in a fiery Russian jet crash near Moscow shortly after takeoff Sunday.
The plane, belonging to Russian commercial carrier Saratov Airlines, disappeared from radar screens about six minutes after departing from Moscow for the approximately two-hour flight to the city of Orsk, about 1,000 miles away.
“Judging by everything, no one has survived this crash,“Russian Minister of Transport Maxim Sokolov said.
Witnesses recalled watching the plane erupt into flames as it fell from the snowy sky at close to 3,000 feet per minute.
“I saw an explosion, so big . . . mushroom-shaped like a nu- clear explosion in miniature,” said an eyewitness who gave his name only as Alexey.
He ran outside in 20-degree temperatures to see what was happening.
“The fragments were flying, burning,” he said.
Plane parts were found strewn in a snow-covered field in the town of Ramenskoye, about 25 miles from Moscow Domodedovo Airport.
Rescuers searched the site on snowmobiles and from helicopters. Several bodies and the craft’s “black box” had been recovered, an official of the Ministry of Emergency Situations told Reuters.
Three children were confirmed dead, including a 5-yearold girl, Nadezhda Krasova, a 12-year-old boy, Evgeny Livanov, and 17-year-old Ilya Poletayev. Two flight attendants in their 20s and the pilot were also among the confirmed victims, according to the emergencies ministry.
Images broadcast on state TV showed relatives waiting at the Orsk airport with their heads in their hands.
Later, video emerged of the fiery crash from afar.
Most of the passengers were from Orsk, whose mayor told a local news channel that a team of psychologists was contracted to comfort grieving families. The other victims were from Moscow and St. Petersburg, with three foreigners from Switzerland, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan.
President Vladimir Putin offered his condolences and ordered an investigation into the cause of the accident.
The An-148 regional jet, developed by Ukraine’s Antonov company, has been flying since 2012, with a two-year break between 2015 and 2017 due to a lack of parts.
An airline spokesperson said there had been no concerns about the plane’s technical condition.
Russian aviation has been plagued by problems since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, but safety records have improved in recent years, The Associated Press reported.