At least 66 people were killed on Monday when a Colombian Air Force plane carrying 125 people crashed just after takeoff in the South American country.
“Unfortunately, the information is of 34 deaths,” Luis Emilio Bustos, the mayor of the nearby town of Puerto Leguizamo, was quoted as saying by Reuters initially, before the military updated the death toll to 66.
Nearly two dozen people, meanwhile, remain missing amid the crash debris, which continued to burn amid rescue attempts, videos on social media showed.
Another official — Jhon Gabriel Molina, the governor of the Putumayo department — had earlier told a local news channel that 34 people were killed while 70 were injured. He had also said that 21 people remained missing, adding, “These are figures that could change.”
What we know about the crash
The accident involved a Lockheed Martin-built Hercules C-130 transport plane, which crashed after flying just 1.5 kilometres after takeoff from Puerto Leguizamo. The ammunition and explosives being carried on board the military transport plane also detonated as a result of the crash, making rescue difficult.
The plane is believed to have suffered an impact near the end of the runway as it was taking off, a firefighter told local news outlet Caracol, as per Reuters. A wing of the aircraft also clipped a tree later as it was plummeting.
While locals rushed to rescue survivors, and military vehicles later arrived, authorities said that the crash site was difficult to reach, which impeded rescue efforts.
Hercules C-130s in Colombia
Hercules C-130 aircraft debuted in the 1950s, and Colombia acquired its first models in the late 1960s, as per Reuters.
Currently, Hercules C-130s used by the Colombian military are frequently used to transport troops to fight in the long-running internal conflict that has plagued the country for six decades and claimed over 450,000 lives.
While C-130 crashes aren’t all that common, another one of these Lockheed aircraft belonging to the Bolivian Air Force crashed in El Alto at the end of February, killing more than 20 and leaving another 30 injured.
