Cargo plane crash kills one in Vilnius, Lithuania

LITHUANIA – An impressive and fatal crash. A DHL cargo plane linking Germany and Lithuania crashed while making an emergency landing on Monday morning, November 25, near the airport in Vilnius, the Lithuanian capital. The authorities do not exclude the possibility of a criminal act, as you can see in our video at the top of the article.

“The plane was supposed to land at Vilnius airport and crashed a few kilometers from the airport”Renatas Pozela, head of the fire and rescue service, told the press. “There were four crew members: two Spaniards, a German and a Lithuanian”Julija Samorokovskaja, a spokesperson for the Vilnius police, told AFP. “One of the Spaniards was killed”while the injured were hospitalized.

“Like fireworks”

According to a press release from DHL Germany, a Swift Air plane, operated by a partner on behalf of DHL and which linked Leipzig (Germany) to the Lithuanian capital, “made an emergency landing about a kilometer away” from Vilnius airport. The accident occurred around 5:30 a.m. According to Ausra Rutkauskiene, a company official in Lithuania, the plane was carrying “shipments from several customers” and not just one.

During the crash, followed by a fire, a house caught fire. The authorities specified that all residents had been evacuated safely. An AFP photographer present on site was able to see the wreckage of the aircraft and the house, as well as dozens of packages scattered on the ground.

« We were awakened by the sound of an explosion. Through the window we saw the explosion wave and a cloud of fire », Explained to AFP Stanislovas Jakimavicius, aged 65 and who lives 300 meters from the crash zone. “Like fireworks (…) Everything then burned with a lot of smoke”he added.

The terrorist trail not excluded

The authorities, who have opened an investigation, remain cautious about the causes of the crash, while not ruling out a terrorist act. “It is premature to associate (the crash) with anything”Darius Jauniskis, the head of Lithuanian intelligence services, told the press. “We are working with our foreign partners to obtain all possible information. We cannot rule out the possibility of a terrorist act”he said.

“We have warned that such things are possible, we see an increasingly aggressive Russia, (…) but we cannot yet (…) point fingers” anyone, said Mr. Jauniskis. According to Defense Minister Laurynas Kasciunas, there is currently no “no signs or evidence to suggest that this was sabotage or a terrorist act”.

Investigators went to the hospital to question the three injured crew members, while the plane's black boxes are to be analyzed to determine if they are “a technical error, a pilot error or something else”he added, specifying that the investigation “could last about a week”.

Incendiary packages

At the beginning of November, several people were arrested in Lithuania and Poland in a case of incendiary packages sent by plane to different European countries, the traces of which could, according to several capitals, lead to Russia. This summer, packages containing incendiary devices were found in DHL warehouses in Germany and Britain, where they caught fire.

In Poland, a package also set fire to a DHL truck, according to the daily Gazeta Wyborcza. “We need to neutralize and dismantle the source, and we know who is behind these operations. This is Russian military intelligence services”declared Kestutis Budrys, an adviser to the Lithuanian president for national security.

German intelligence had previously also pointed the finger at the Russian Federation. On October 14, during a hearing in the Bundestag (the German lower house), the head of German domestic intelligence, Thomas Haldenwang, openly accused Moscow of being behind the“DHL affair”referring to the case of a package which caught fire at a carrier center in Leipzig in July. This crash could be “an accident or incident” linked to a “external intervention”commented Berlin.

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