On 4 November 2015, an

Antonov An-12 The Antonov An-12 ( Russian: Антонов Ан-12; NATO reporting name: Cub) is a four-engined turboprop transport aircraft designed in the Soviet Union. It is the military version of the Antonov An-10 and has many variants. For more than thr ...

cargo aircraft crashed near the

White Nile The White Nile ( ') is a river in Africa, the minor of the two main tributaries of the Nile, the larger being the Blue Nile. The name "White" comes from the clay sediment carried in the water that changes the water to a pale color. In the stri ...

shortly after takeoff from

Juba International Airport Juba is the capital and largest city of South Sudan. The city is situated on the White Nile and also serves as the capital of the Central Equatoria State. It is the most recently declared national capital and had a population of 525,953 in 20 ...

serving

Juba Juba is the capital and largest city of South Sudan. The city is situated on the White Nile and also serves as the capital of the Central Equatoria, Central Equatoria State. It is the most recently declared national capital and had a populatio ...

, the capital city of

South Sudan South Sudan (), officially the Republic of South Sudan, is a landlocked country in East Africa. It is bordered on the north by Sudan; on the east by Ethiopia; on the south by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda and Kenya; and on the ...

. At least 37 people were killed, including the crew of six. The crash is the deadliest aviation accident to have occurred in South Sudan since independence in 2011.

Accident

The aircraft was operating a cargo flight from

to Paloich Airport in the extreme northeastern

, an oil field. It departed Juba's runway 13 but impacted a hill about past the runway end and came to rest on the banks of the

. Authorities in South Sudan reported that the aircraft was overloaded, with most of the passengers being oil workers. The government spokesman of South Sudan said that there were at least 18 people on board. Early reports of the number killed varied, but the total now stands at 37, according to South Sudan's Minister of Transportation, Kuong Danhier Gatluak. The crew of the plane comprised five Armenians and one Russian. There were initially three survivors, passenger Wuor Arop and an unrelated 13-month-old baby girl whom he had cradled, together with a third, reported to be a crew member, who later died in hospital. It is common for the security services to place family members on cargo planes to Paloich even if they are not on the manifest, according to Kenyi Galla, assistant operations manager for Combined Air Services, a company that operates chartered flights across South Sudan.

Aircraft

The aircraft involved was an

Antonov An-12BK The Antonov An-12 is a four-engined turboprop transport aircraft designed and produced by Antonov. It was produced in many customized variants for uses within the country and for exports. The aircraft was used for military purposes, in emergen ...

with

Tajikistan Tajikistan, officially the Republic of Tajikistan, is a landlocked country in Central Asia. Dushanbe is the capital city, capital and most populous city. Tajikistan borders Afghanistan to the Afghanistan–Tajikistan border, south, Uzbekistan to ...

i registration EY-406,

serial number A serial number (SN) is a unique identifier used to ''uniquely'' identify an item, and is usually assigned incrementally or sequentially. Despite being called serial "numbers", they do not need to be strictly numerical and may contain letters ...

01347704, built in 1971 by TAPOiCh of

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

. It was operated by Allied Services Ltd, a logistics company based in South Sudan at Juba airport, leased from Tajikistan's Asia Airways.

Investigation

An unnamed source at the Russian aviation agency said that the An-12 appeared to have been overloaded.

References

External links

Photos
of the aircraft involved at

Airliners.net Airliners.net is a Canadian-owned, Australian-based global aviation website that includes an extensive photo database of aircraft and airports, as well as a forum catering to aviation enthusiasts. Inititally Swedish-based, created by Swede Joh ...

{{Aviation accidents and incidents in 2015 2015 in South Sudan Accidents and incidents involving the Antonov An-12 Aviation accidents and incidents in 2015 Aviation accidents and incidents in South Sudan History of Juba November 2015 in Africa 2015 disasters in Africa

Accident

Aircraft

Investigation

See also

References

External links