More than 250 dead in Algerian military plane crash
More than 250 dead in Algerian military plane crash More than 250 people were killed on Wednesday when a military plane crashed in a field outside Algeria’s capital, as per official statement. Television footage showed crowds gathering around the smoking and flaming wreckage near Boufarik airport southwest of Algiers. A total of 257 people died in the crash and about 300 emergency workers are working at the scene, as per reports. The dead included 26 members of Polisario, an Algerian-backed group fighting for the independence of neighbouring Western Sahara. Civil protection agency spokesman Farouk Achour told The Associated Press that some passengers were “extracted with deep burns caused by the fuselage catching fire”. The cause of the crash was unclear, and an investigation has been opened, according to a Defense Ministry statement. Local media reported that the plane crashed just after taking off. “There are more than 100 deaths. We can’t say exact how many at this point,” Mohammed Achour, chief spokesman for the civil protection agency, told The Associated Press. He said the plane was carrying soldiers. The Defense Ministry did not provide a death toll but expressed condolences to the victims’ families. The flight had just taken off from Boufarik, about 30 kilometers (20 miles) southwest of the capital Algiers, for a military base in Bechar in southwest Algeria, Achour said. It was scheduled to make a layover in Tindouf in southern Algeria, home to many refugees from the neighbouring Western Sahara, a disputed territory annexed by Morocco. -PTC News
