At least 16 people were killed when an aircraft carrying skydivers crashed shortly after takeoff in the Russian region of Tatarstan.
In addition, six people were reportedly seriously injured in the October 10 incident near the city of Menzelinsk.
Russian news agencies reported that 22 people were aboard the aircraft, including 20 parachutists and two crew members. Interfax reported that seven people had been rescued alive.
The aircraft was a twin-engine L-410, which was designed by the Czechoslovakian firm Let Kunovice (now Aircraft Industries), and has been produced in Russia in the Urals city of Yekaterinburg since 2018.
It is designed to transport up to 19 passengers a distance up to 1,500 kilometers. An unnamed source told the TASS news agency that overloading was being investigated as a contributing factor in the Tatarstan incident.
It was the third fatal crash involving an L-410 since June.
On June 19, three passengers and two pilots were killed when an L-410 made a hard landing in Siberia’s Kemerovo Oblast.
On September 13, four people were killed when an L-410 crashed in a remote forested area of Siberia’s Irkutsk region.
The L-410 that crashed in Tatarstan belonged to a volunteer military-preparedness organization known by the acronym DOSAAF.
