Four survivors are now traveling with local officials to the remote mountainous site where the crash occurred, two officials in Afghanistan's Badakhshan province said. They said the remaining two passengers had died.
Badakhshan province, where the plane crashed, is located in eastern Afghanistan, bordering Tajikistan and Pakistan. Photo: Ghaith Abdul-Ahad
Taliban government spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said the plane's pilot was among the four survivors.
The Russian-registered charter plane carrying six people disappeared from radar screens in Afghanistan a day earlier, Russia's aviation agency Rosaviatsia said on Sunday.
The plane was a chartered ambulance flight from Thailand's Utapao Airport in Pattaya to Moscow, with stops in India and Uzbekistan. It was a 1978 French-made Falcon 10, Rosaviatsia said in a statement.
About 25 minutes before the plane disappeared from radar, the pilot warned that fuel was running low and that the plane would attempt to land at an airport in Tajikistan, according to Russia's SHOT news agency. The pilot later reported that one engine had stopped and the second had also stopped.
The flight was carrying out a private medical evacuation from Thailand's Pattaya, a popular tourist destination for Russians, to Moscow, Russian state news agency TASS reported, citing the Russian Embassy in Bangkok.
“On board the plane was a bedridden patient in serious condition, a Russian citizen, who was transferred from one of the hospitals in Pattaya to Russia. She was accompanied by her husband, a private businessman, also a Russian citizen, who paid for the flight,” RIA news agency quoted a source at Thailand’s Utapao International Airport as saying.
Russia's Investigative Committee said it had opened a criminal case to determine whether safety regulations had been violated. The plane's owner is a small Russian company called Athletic Group LLC.
Bui Huy (according to Reuters, RIA, TASS)
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