PRETORIA, December 25. /TASS/. A transport plane that overshot the runway in the east of the Democractic Republic of Congo (DRC) on Monday was navigated by Russian pilots, Russia’s ambassador to the country, Alexei Sentebov, told TASS on Tuesday.
"Russian citizens were in control of the plane, but, according to our information, they received no serious injuries," the Russian diplomat said.
The plane had 68 passengers on board, most of them were DRC servicemen. A military spokesperson earlier said the plane "overshot [the runway] while landing." As a result, 40 people were injured, eight of them seriously.
"Russian pilots arrive to work in DRC not in some official capacity, but as private citizens, and not all of them apply for being registered with the consular department. Therefore, we have no information on how many Russians are currently employed with local companies and, quite often, we learn about such incidents only from representatives of those companies," Sentebov said.
This is the second major air incident involving Russian pilots in DRC in less than a week. Last Thursday, a Gomair An-26 plane that was engaged to take electoral materials to Congo’s regions ahead of the upcoming presidential and parliamentary elections crashed when it was on its way back to Kinshasa from Tshikapa. There were 23 people aboard the plane, including the Russian crew. Seven people died, including three crew members.
On December 21, Russia’s embassy in the Democratic Republic of the Congo confirmed the death of three Russian pilots - Ivan Masalov (born in 1955), Alexander Kretov (born in 1954) and Yevgeny Tarasov (born in 1959). Their relatives have submitted visa applications and are expected to arrive in Kinshasa soon. It is still unclear, whether the pilots had the insurance that would cover the expenses of transporting their bodies to Russia. If not, their employer Gomair will have to defray those costs.