Passenger plane crashes in Kazakhstan flying from Azerbaijan to Russia

On By Littum

Mariya Gordeyeva, Gleb Stolyarov and Nailia Bagirova
| Reuters

ASTANA, Kazakhstan – An Embraer passenger jet flying from Azerbaijan to Russia crashed in Kazakhstan on Wednesday with 62 passengers and five crew members on board, Kazakh authorities announced, saying 32 survivors had been rescued.

Azerbaijan Airlines flight J2-8243 had flown hundreds of miles off its planned route to crash on the opposite shore of the Caspian Sea near the city of Aktau after what Russia’s aviation watchdog said was an emergency that may have been caused by a bird strike.

Officials did not immediately explain why it had crossed the sea, but the crash came shortly after drone strikes hit southern Russia. Drone activity has previously closed airports in the area, and the closest Russian airport in the plane’s flight path was closed Wednesday morning.

Video of the crash showed the plane descending rapidly before bursting into flames as it hit the shore, thick black smoke then rising. Bloodied and bruised passengers could be seen stumbling from a piece of the fuselage that had remained intact.

Reuters was able to confirm from visible landmarks that the video was shot on the Caspian coast near Aktau.

Kazakhstan’s Emergencies Ministry said in a statement that firefighters had extinguished the fire and that the survivors, including two children, were being treated at a nearby hospital. The bodies of the dead were found.

Azerbaijan Airlines said the Embraer 190 jet was flying from Baku to Grozny, the capital of the Chechnya region in southern Russia, but had been forced to make an emergency landing about 1.8 miles from Aktau in Kazakhstan.

“Preliminary: after a collision with birds, due to an emergency on board, its commander decided to ‘go’ to an alternative airfield – Aktau was chosen,” Russia’s aviation watchdog said on Telegram.

Russian airport on the flight path was closed

Aktau is located on the opposite shore of the Caspian Sea from Azerbaijan and Russia. Commercial aviation tracking websites tracked the flight flying north on its planned route along the west coast before its flight path was no longer recorded. It then reappeared on the east coast and circled near Aktau Airport before crashing onto the beach.

Authorities in two Russian regions bordering Chechnya, Ingushetia and North Ossetia reported drone attacks on Wednesday morning.

An official at Makhachkala airport in Russia on the east coast of the Caspian Sea, the airport closest to where the flight disappeared from tracking, told Reuters it had been closed to inbound traffic for several hours on Wednesday morning. Reuters could not immediately reach officials at Grozny airport.

Authorities in Kazakhstan said a government commission had been set up to investigate what had happened, and its members ordered to fly to the scene and ensure the families of the dead and injured got the help they needed.

Kazakhstan will cooperate with Azerbaijan on the investigation, the government said.

President Vladimir Putin expressed his condolences, as did Ilham Aliyev, the president of Azerbaijan, who had decided to return home from Russia where he was due to attend a summit on Wednesday, his office said.

Ramzan Kadyrov, the Kremlin-backed leader of Chechnya, expressed his condolences in a statement, saying some of those treated at the hospital were in an extremely serious condition and that he and others would pray for their speedy recovery.