No Survivors After Russian Helicopter Crashes Near Volcano; Authorities Find Wreckage in Far East

A helicopter carrying 22 people crashed in the country's Far East, Russia's Emergencies Ministry announced. None of those on board survived.

Moscow: In a tragic incident, a helicopter carrying 22 people, including three crew members, crashed in Russia’s Far East on Sunday (local time), according to the country’s Emergencies Ministry. Tragically, none of the people on board survived, CNN reported, citing Russian state media TASS. The rescue team has recovered seventeen bodies so far.

The helicopter, which had 19 passengers and three crew members on board, took off near the Vachkazhets volcano on Saturday and was headed to the village of Nikolaevka when it went down, the governor of the Kamchatka region, Vladimir Solodov, said Saturday on Telegram after the search began.

“The helicopter had taken off near the region’s Vachkazhets volcano, a tourist attraction in the remote Kamchatka Peninsula, and was heading towards the village of Nikolaevka,” Solodov said.

On Sunday, Solodov said that the wreckage of the helicopter, an Mi-8, had been found and that “we are doing everything possible to get specialists to the scene as quickly as we can.”

A rescue team found the wreckage on Sunday at an altitude of 900 metres, or almost 3,000 feet, not far from where the helicopter’s crew had last made contact, Russia’s ministry of emergencies said on Telegram.

According to the Ministry, the rescue crew found 17 bodies. The emergency service told the state news agency Tass that, based on the condition of the wreckage, no survivors were expected.

Further, the agency posted a photo and video on Telegram that showed shards of a helicopter lying on the side of a steep hill in a mountainous region.

Kamchatka’s Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring Department often notes that the locale regularly battles harsh, quickly shifting, and nearly Arctic weather. Just last weekend, this area had to deal with fog, a light drizzle, and poor visibility. A sorrowful event from the previous year came to mind, when a tourist-filled Mi-8 helicopter met with a terrible accident, plunging into Kamchatka’s deep volcanic crater lake, tragically claiming eight lives.