Algerian military transport crash leaves 257 dead
At least 257 people, mostly soldiers and members of their families, were killed in an Algerian military plane crash 11 April the defence ministry said.
The II-76 transport plane crashed shortly after take-off from the Boufarik airbase, about 15 miles southwest of the capital Algiers.
The dead include the plane’s 10 crew and 247 passengers, most of them members of the armed forces, the ministry said in a statement.
An Algerian transport plane with around 100 army personnel on board crashed on Wednesday shortly after taking off from an airbase outside the capital.
Algeria has suffered a string of military and civilian aviation disasters.
Two military planes collided mid-flight in December 2012 during a training exercise in Tlemcen, in the far west of the country, killing the pilots of both planes.
In February 2014, 77 people died when a military plane carrying army personnel and family members crashed between Tamanrasset in southern Algeria and the eastern city of Constantine.
Only one person survived after the C-130 Hercules transport aircraft came down in the mountainous Oum el Bouaghi region.
The defence ministry blamed that crash on bad weather.
The Il-76 aircraft (pictured, foreground) is utilised by a range of military and private operators.
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