"There were 18 people aboard the aircraft, including three crew members. All of them died," the source in the regional emergency services said. A helicopter performed a hard landing in Siberia on Saturday morning, Russian Emergency Ministry's department in the Krasnoyarsk region said.
"At 10:20 a.m. on August 4, 2018, a Mi-8 helicopter performed a hard landing in Turukhansk district 2 kilometers from the village of Igarka," the statement read.
"The crash site has been found," the source in the regional emergency services said, adding the aircraft fell apart and burst into flames. "A technical failure and a pilot's error are regarded as the main possible causes of the crash," the source added. The helicopter flew 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) before it crashed.
Transport authorities in Western Siberia have told Sputnik they have opened a probe into the crash of a Mi-8 helicopter in Russia’s Krasnoyarsk region.
"The Transportation Prosecutor's Office for Western Siberia has opened an investigation into a possible violation of air transport safety regulations," a spokesperson for the agency said.
Two "black boxes" have been pulled from the wreckage of the crashed helicopter that came down near a remote Siberian village on Saturday, a source told Sputnik.
The helicopter belonged to Utair airline, the source added. There were three crew and 15 oil industry workers aboard from Vankor No1 oil pumping station when it hit the ground and burst into flames at 10:20 a.m. local time. No one survived.
A spokesperson for the regional emergencies authority told Sputnik that a helicopter crashed after it was hit by cargo dangling from another copter.
"Utair’s Mi-8 helicopter 25640 was flying from Vankor to Kharkasale. During the take-off it struck cargo hanging from the landing gear of another Mi-8 helicopter," the spokesperson told Sputnik.
