A passenger plane carrying 48 people crashed Thursday morning near Tynda in Russia’s Amur region, killing everyone on board, officials said.
The Antonov An-24 aircraft, with 42 passengers and six crew members on board, disappeared from radar as it neared Tynda Airport after departing from Blagoveshchensk near the Chinese border, officials said.
A Russian civil aviation helicopter later spotted the plane’s burning fuselage on a remote hillside roughly 16 kilometers (10 miles) from Tynda.
An-24 crash site in Russia’s Far East seen from helicopter — social media footage
49 on board, including 5 children and 6 crew — no survivors reported
Malfunction or human error considered as possible causes https://t.co/pLMgFY7kBG pic.twitter.com/rU5VWLOnXH
— RT (@RT_com) July 24, 2025
“I regret to inform you that there are no survivors,” Amur Oblast Governor Vasily Orlov wrote on Telegram. “Rescuers have reached the crash site.”
Orlov declared three days of mourning for the victims of the crash.
According to reports, Angara Airlines, based in Siberia’s Irkutsk region, operated the flight. All crew members were said to be from the same area, and several passengers were reportedly employees of Russian Railways working in the Far East.
Emergency officials said the crash may have been caused by pilot error or a technical problem.
The Antonov An-24 aircraft was nearly 50 years old. Originally designed in Kyiv during the Soviet era, this model has not been in use in Ukraine for several years.
Officials said the plane had recently passed a technical inspection. However, Russia’s civil aviation authority noted the aircraft had been involved in four incidents since 2018.
In one case seven years ago, the plane’s left wing was damaged after it overran a runway and struck a lightning mast, according to the Tass news agency.
Other An-24s have also been involved in deadly accidents. In 2019, an An-24RV veered off the runway while landing at Nizhneangarsk Airport, killing two crew members.
