Aktau [Kazakhstan], December 26: An Embraer, opens a new tab passenger jet crashed near the city of Aktau in Kazakhstan on Wednesday, killing 38 people, after diverting from an area of Russia that Moscow has recently defended against Ukrainian drone attacks.
Twenty-nine survivors received hospital treatment.
Azerbaijan Airlines flight J2-8243 had flown hundreds of miles off its scheduled route from Azerbaijan to Russia to crash on the opposite shore of the Caspian Sea after what Russia's aviation watchdog said was an emergency that may have been caused by a bird strike. But an aviation expert suggested that cause seemed unlikely.
Officials did not immediately explain why it had crossed the sea, but the crash came after Ukrainian drone strikes this month hit the Chechnya region of southern Russia. The nearest Russian airport on the plane's flight path was closed on Wednesday morning.
Kyiv has not acknowledged strikes this month in the Chechen city of Grozny, where the flight was headed.
Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev said that according to information he had received, the plane changed course due to poor weather, but he added that the cause of the crash was unknown and that it must be fully investigated.
Video of the crash showed the plane descending rapidly before bursting into flames as it hit the seashore, and thick black smoke then rising. Bloodied and bruised passengers could be seen stumbling from a piece of the fuselage that had remained intact.
Source: Fijian Broadcasting Cooperation
