Emergency crews have recovered the bodies of all 42 victims killed when a Slovak military plane crashed into a mountainside in north-eastern Hungary as it flew troops home from peacekeeping duty in Kosovo, officials said on Friday.
Only one person of the 43 on board survived when the AN-24 aircraft went down on Thursday near the Slovak border, Interior Minister Monika Lamperth said.
”It was very clear at the site that there could be no other survivors,” Lamperth told reporters in Budapest.
Hungarian Defence Minister Ferenc Juhasz said the survivor, who suffered head injuries and burns, was in ”satisfactory” condition at a hospital in the Slovak city of Kosice, about 15km from the crash site. The plane had been carrying Slovak soldiers home from a Nato-led peacekeeping mission in Kosovo, he said.
Juhasz said the survivor was able to call his wife on his cellphone from the crash site.
Slovak media identified the survivor as Martin Farkas (27). His wife, Michaela Farkasova, said she received a call from his cellphone after the plane crashed.
”He called me to say the plane crashed and that I should alert the police, rescuers and such,” Farkasova told Slovak TA3 station in a phone interview. ”He said he was alive but weak.”
It was not immediately clear how he got out of the plane and what happened before the crash near the Hungarian town of Hejce, just 10km from the Slovak border.
”He was walking around the burning plane, looking for the best [cellphone] signal so he could seek help,” Farkasova told TASR news agency, adding that the conversation was soon cut off.
The soldier apparently trudged through knee-deep snow and freezing temperatures before being picked up by a Hungarian ambulance.
According to eyewitnesses, the Ukrainian-designed plane was flying extremely low when it plowed into a forest, crushing trees for about 600m before slamming into a mountain. Air traffic controllers lost sight of the aircraft just after 7.30pm local time.
A second Slovak military aircraft, an AN-26 flying a few minutes behind, was able to see the plane’s burning remains.
Emergency crews retrieved the bodies of all 42 people killed in the crash by Friday afternoon, said Tibor Dobson, spokesperson for Hungary’s national rescue service.
At the scene, workers placed the victims’ remains in black bags and lay them on the bed of a military truck while Hungarian soldiers tried to keep warm by lighting fires near the wreckage.
Juhasz ruled out a terrorist attack as a possible cause of the crash, but said it will take up to two months until a full report is completed.
The defence minister said the plane had appeared on course for landing in Kosice, but strayed off its route by about 3km as it approached the Slovak border.
”The plane was constantly descending and preparing to land … and the deviation was noticed only at the last moment,” Juhasz said.
Juraj Baranek, commander of the Slovak Air Force, said the pilots did not report any problems to air-traffic controllers before the crash, Slovakia’s state TASR news agency said.
On Gergely Hill, parts of the plane’s rear could be clearly identified but its wings and fuselage were practically burned to ashes in the fire after the crash.
The plane’s black box, which could provide clues about the crash, had been located and was being recovered from the wreckage, a Hungarian defence ministry spokesperson said.
Milan Varga, a spokesperson for Slovakia’s defence ministry, said his country was considering whether to ask Hungary for the black box to be analysed in Slovakia.
Hungarian officials sent condolence messages to Slovakia, while the premier also spoke to his Slovak counterpart late on Thursday to brief him on the crash.
Kosovo lawmakers, meanwhile, held a minute of silence on Friday, while Nato Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer also expressed his condolences.
”I am deeply saddened by the death of so many Slovak soldiers in last night’s terrible accident,” he said in a statement. ”These soldiers were returning home after serving the cause of peace in Kosovo, helping to bring stability and security to the people there.” — Sapa-AP