Civilian airliner crashes outside Moscow (VIDEO)
A Russian Sukhoi Superjet 100 airliner has crashed outside of Moscow, local officials have said. There were three crew members reported on board.
Local authorities told TASS that the plane crashed on Friday afternoon in the Kolomna district, some 80km southeast of the Russian capital, and that emergency services had been dispatched to the scene. The plane, which typically seats 87 to 98 passengers, belonged to Russian gas giant Gazprom, was undergoing repairs and had taken off as part of a test flight, they added.
A crew of three was on board, officials said.
The Russian Emergencies Ministry has confirmed the crash, adding that the plane fell in a forested area. “There were three crew members on the plane. According to preliminary information, they all died. There are no casualties among the population,” it said.
TASS initially reported that the Sukhoi Superjet 100 had taken off from Zhukovsky airfield for a fly-by. Later, however, it clarified that the jet had taken off from another nearby airfield, Lukovitsy, and was heading for Vnukovo International Airport. The agency’s source explained the mix-up by saying that another plane of the same type had taken off from Zhukovsky and was flying without incident.
The agency added that the aircraft that crashed had been produced in 2014 and delivered to Gazprom the next year, which was its sole operator.
Russia’s Federal Air Transport Agency said that the incident would be investigated by the Interstate Aviation Committee (IAC) operating under the jurisdiction the Commonwealth of Independent States, which includes several post-Soviet republics. Russian experts will also be involved, it added.
Several hours after the incident, the head of the Kolomna district, Aleksander Grechischev, posted a video from where the plane came down. The clip shows a lot of felled trees and a number of emergency workers securing the area around the remains of the plane, which appears to have been mostly destroyed in the crash. Grechischev reiterated that there was no threat to nearby settlements.
The Sukhoi Superjet 100, which made its maiden flight in 2008, has been involved in several crashes. The most recent one occurred in 2019 at Sheremetyevo Airport. A flight en route to the northern city of Murmansk had to return to Moscow after being struck by lightning. The jet then made a crash landing at the airport and caught fire, killing 41 people.
