MOSCOW: A Soviet-era Antonov-24 aircraft carrying 30 passengers landed on a frozen river near an airport in Russia’s far east on Thursday because of pilot error, transport prosecutors said.
Flight PI217 left Yakutsk, the capital of the Sakha republic in Russia’s Far East, early on Thursday.
It was bound for Zyryanka, 1,100km (685 miles) to the north-east, and was due to fly on to another small town in Srednekolymsk before returning to Yakutsk.
The Polar Airlines An-24 landed safely on the Kolyma river near Zyryanka in the Yakutia region, the prosecutors said.
“According to preliminary information, the cause of the aviation incident was an error by the crew in piloting the aircraft,” a spokesperson for the Eastern Siberian transport prosecutor said in a statement.
Prosecutors published pictures of the aircraft on a frozen river.
The Izvestia newspaper published pictures of passengers disembarking.
“The An-24 aircraft landed outside of the runway of the Zyryanka airport,” Polar Airlines said in a short statement.
“There were no casualties,” it said.
