As many as 22 people have been killed as a Ukraine military plane crashed in the eastern city of Kharkiv. Officials have stated that most of the dead were cadets. An Antonov-26, the aircraft carrying cadets, came down as it was landing near the eastern city of Kharkiv Saturday.
The military plane was on a training flight with military cadets from the Kharkiv Air Force University of Ukraine. After the incident, the Emergency Ministry of Ukraine has started a total of 27 people were on board.
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According to the local media reports, two people were seriously injured, and the search for three missing people is continuing into the night. Meanwhile, aviation officials are also investigating the crash to determine the cause.
The emergency ministry officials further added that the military plane came down nearly 2 kilometers away from an army airbase in Chuhuiv. However, there is not enough evidence so far to connect the crash to the ongoing conflict in the eastern part of Ukraine.
The city of Chuhuiv is just 60 miles away from the frontline, where the pro-Russian fighters are fighting the Ukrainian government forces. Soon after the crash, the fire broke out at the scene but was later extinguished.
Moreover, Anton Gerashchenko, the deputy Interior Minister of Ukraine, said the crash came as a shock for the people of the country and added that at this moment, it is hard to determine the cause of the crash, AFP reported.
On Saturday, Volodymyr Zelensky, the President of Ukraine, is also due to travel in the region. Meanwhile, the investigation into the crash is underway. Oleksiy Kucher, the regional governor of Kharkiv, said that the preliminary information suggested that one of the pilots had informed the control tower about engine failure before the crash.
Meanwhile, RushHourDaily reported that an eyewitness told them that he saw a man in flames running from the wreckage of the plane. He further said “Another car stopped behind us. We took a fire extinguisher and ran with another driver to help him,” RushHourDaily reported.
