On Sunday, the aviation watchdog of Russia said four people survived the crash of a charter plane in northern Afghanistan, citing the Russian embassy there. The condition of two other passengers on board was not yet clear, it said. The jet was bound for Moscow.
Four survivors were with Taliban administration officials who had reached the remote, mountainous site of the crash, said two Taliban provincial officials. They said that two other passengers had died.
The pilot of the plane was among four who had survived, said the Taliban administration’s top spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid.
A day earlier, the Russian-registered charter plane with six people on board disappeared from radar screens over Afghanistan, said Russian aviation authority Rosaviatsia on Sunday.
The plane was a charter ambulance flight. It was travelling from Utapao Airport of Thailand in Pattaya to Moscow.
Nearly 25 minutes before the aircraft disappeared from radar screens, the pilot cautioned that fuel was running low and that the airplane would try to land at an airport in Tajikistan, reported Russian news outlet SHOT, citing an unnamed source.
(With inputs from Reuters)