Plane Crash Kills 11 in Yakutia

VLADIVOSTOK. November 2. VOSTOK-MEDIA – Eleven people have died in a plane crash in the Republic of Sakha, Yakutia, Rossiyskaya Gazeta daily wrote.

On Sunday, 8:40 am local time, the Interior Ministry plane took-off from Mirny airport and after a little while it crashed into an ore dump. According to Natalya Shakhurdina, a spokeswoman for the regional center of Transport Department of Internal Affairs, right after take-off, the plane lurched to the right, flew about two kilometers at a height of 20-30 meters and crashed into the ore dump. Witnesses say they heard the explosion and saw clouds of smoke that followed.

When rescuers and firefighters came to the crash site they saw parts of the crashed plane scattered within a 500-meter radius. There were no ground fatalities because there are no buildings near the place of accident.

After the fire was extinguished rescuers managed to find 11 bodies of the crew as well as flight recorders, which subsequently were sent for analysis.

According to Vasily Panchenko, a spokesman for the Emergencies Ministrys regional center, the plane was bound for Irkutsk, where it was to take RF Internal Affairs security troops aboard for carrying out force rotation in Caucasus.

The investigation of the plane crash is conducted by the flying safety service committee under the RF Ministry of Defense. In addition, Committee of the General Headquarters of the Ministry of Internal Affairs started off for Mirny airport for accident history taking.