The investigators said they favored the track of a “technical fault” on the device, a Sukhoi 34, to explain the accident which had occurred the day before in this city of 90,000 inhabitants located opposite the Ukrainian port of Mariupol, devastated by the forces Russians at the start of the conflict.
“A victim died of his burns,” said Anna Minkova, deputy governor of the Russian region of Krasnodar, on Telegram, raising the toll of this disaster to 15 dead.
She said that the number of injured totaled 43 people, including 9 children. Among these forty people, 25 are still in hospital, including three in critical condition.
Vladimir Putin “offers his most sincere condolences to the families who lost their loved ones in this disaster,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
The accident took place on Monday evening, when the Sukhoi 34 crashed during a training flight in the middle of building bars.
The plane, filled with fuel, quickly caught fire, setting fire to the passage, according to the Ministry of Emergency Situations, five levels of a building, covering some 2,000 m2.
The Russian Investigation Committee stressed that the pilot, who managed to eject before the tragedy, was questioned by his services.
Flight recorders were recovered from the site of the disaster and fuel samples were taken from the airfield from which the bomber took off, continued this body responsible for the main investigations in Russia.
– “In mourning” –
The plane fell on an apartment building with 600 residents.
Vladimir Putin quickly dispatched Health Minister Mikhail Murashko and Emergency Situations Minister Alexander Kurenkov to the scene, according to a Kremlin statement.
Governor Veniamin Kondratiev, for his part, decreed a period of mourning in his region on Tuesday.
The images of the explosion and flames enveloping the entire facade of the building provoked strong reactions in Russia.
A video posted on social networks showed residents of Yeysk finding the pilot near the building. Asked whether his aircraft had been shot down by a missile, still haggard, he simply replied: “No”.
On Tuesday, Russians laid flowers and toys, in memory of the children killed in the tragedy, in front of the building with a sign: “Yeisk. 17/10/2022. We will remember. We are in mourning”.
Interviewed on Russian television, Natalia Kouch, a resident of the affected building said “heard a terrible explosion. I looked outside and saw the pilot flying right next to me,” she said.
Footage of the wreckage shows the plane cut in half, the Russian military logo on one of its wings, with cables protruding from the engine.
At least five floors of the building were charred, with a balcony that collapsed and cars destroyed nearby.
