Helicopter crash kills 18 in Russia's Siberia

MOSCOW - A helicopter crash in Russia's Krasnoyarsk region in Siberia killed all 18 people on board on Saturday, the Russian Emergencies Ministry said.

None of the 15 passengers and three crew members on board survived, the ministry said.

All the passengers were reportedly staff members of a subsidiary of the Russian state oil company Rosneft.

According to preliminary data, the helicopter belonging to Russia's UTair airline collided with the external cargo suspension of another helicopter that took off earlier, before it fell, collapsed and burnt, a statement published by Russia's Federal Air Transport Agency said.

The acting governor of the Krasnoyarsk region Alexander Uss declared Monday a day of mourning for the victims, the regional government's spokeswoman Elena Ulyasheva said.

The head of the region has also instructed relevant government bodies to make arrangements to meet and accommodate the victims' relatives with necessary psychological and medical care, as well as to work on the issue of providing financial assistance to the families of the victims.

A task force was set up to establish the causes of the crash, and criminal investigators from Russia's Investigative Committee were sent to the scene, the committee said in a statement.

The investigators are checking the flight documentation, taking fuel samples and interrogating maintenance personnel, employees of the airline and witnesses of the crash, the committee said.

All possible causes are under consideration, including the possibility of pilot error, it added.

Both black boxes of the helicopter have been found, a source in regional emergency services was quoted by Sputnik news agency as saying, adding that the recorders are in a satisfactory condition.

The helicopter that crashed was manufactured in 2010 and the pilot had nearly 6,000 hours of experience, including 2,300 as a captain, UTair said.

Xinhua - Ap

(China Daily 08/06/2018 page12)