SUDAN: Cargo plane crashes and explodes in Khartoum, all 4 crew feared dead

Record ID: 382694

  • Title: SUDAN: Cargo plane crashes and explodes in Khartoum, all 4 crew feared dead
  • Date: 30th June 2008
  • Summary: PIECE OF BODY ON GROUND
  • Embargoed: 15th July 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Sudan
  • Country: Sudan
  • Topics: Disasters / Accidents / Natural catastrophes
  • Reuters ID: LVAEB95EJHKHMDEGB4D7H2W7XQU
  • Story Text: A cargo plane crashes in Sudan, bursting into flames and killing all four crew, witnesses and officials say.
    A cargo plane crashed shortly after taking off from Khartoum airport on Monday (June 30), exploding into a fireball and killing all four Russian crew, witnesses and officials said. It was the fourth fatal air accident in Sudan in two months.
    According to officials from the Sudan civil aviation authority, the accident happened less than a kilometre (half a mile) from the airport, just seconds after it took off. Four of the crew, all of them Russians, were killed.
    He said the plane was carrying goods to the southern town of Juba for Ababeel Aviation, a private cargo company.
    The plane, a Russian-built Ilyushin Il-76 was taking off from the airport when it reportedly blew up into a fireball.
    Witnesses at the crash scene said the plane appeared to have careered across a major road and exploded in an open space near an office building.
    Wreckage was strewn across a wide area and firefighters were putting out the blaze.
    Police and emergency workers cordoned off the area and a Reuters cameraman said he had been briefly detained.
    Monday's crash was the fourth deadly aviation incident in Sudan in two months. At least 30 people were killed when a passenger plane caught fire at Khartoum airport in early June.
    In May southern Sudan's minister of defence and a presidential adviser were among at least 23 people killed in a plane crash in the south. On Friday, a Sudanese cargo plane crashed in bad weather, killing seven of the eight crew.
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