A Russian military transport plane crashed on Tuesday with 15 people on board after one of its engines burst into flames after takeoff — reportedly killing all on board, fiery video shows.
The Il-76 plane carrying eight crew members and seven passengers went down in the Ivanovo region northeast of Moscow, according to Russia’s Defense Ministry. It is unclear who the passengers were and where they were headed.
Dramatic cellphone footage shared on the “112” Telegram channel showed the aircraft with one engine ablaze rapidly losing altitude.
Another video showed a plume of thick black smoke rising into the sky over a wooded area.
Online news outlets reported that there were no survivors.
“At about 1:00 p.m. Moscow time, an IL-76 military transport aircraft crashed during takeoff for a scheduled flight in the Ivanovo region,” the Defense Ministry was quoted as saying by the state-run TASS news agency.
The ministry’s statement said that an engine fire was the likely cause of the crash.
The engine reportedly became engulfed in flames almost immediately after the plane took off from the “Severny” air base.
The pilots were said to have attempted to return to the airfield for an emergency landing but could not make it.
The crew, however, was able to get the burning plane away from a residential area, before it crashed in the woods near a cemetery outside the village of Bogorodskoe, reported the Telegram channel “112.”
The four-engine Il-76 is a heavy-lift transport plane that has been in service since the 1970s with the Soviet and then Russian Airforce.
With Post Wires