Algerian military plane crash: 257 soldiers dead after aircraft goes down near Boufarik airport

According to Algeria's defense ministry, 257 people have died in a military plane crash on Wednesday near Boufarik airport.

Civil protection agency spokesman Farouk Achour told The Associated Press that some passengers were "extracted with deep burns caused by the fuselage catching fire." He informed that more than 300 emergency workers are working at the scene. The crash site is close (30 kilometres) to the capital city of Algiers in northern Algeria. Emergency services have been sent to the crash site. The Algerie Presse service agency said the Iliouchine-type plane was headed for Bechar in south-western Algeria.

Local media reported that the plane crashed just after taking off. Emergency services converged on the area near the Boufarik military base after the crash. Footage from the scene showed thick black smoke coming off the field, as well as ambulances and Red Crescent vehicles arriving at the site. The flight had just taken off from Boufarik, about 30 kilometers (20 miles) southwest of the capital Algiers, for a military base in Bechar in southwest Algeria, Achour said. It was scheduled to make a layover in Tindouf in southern Algeria, home to many refugees from the neighboring Western Sahara, a disputed territory annexed by Morocco.

In the past four years, the North African nation has witnessed a number of planes crashes,mostly of military aircrafts. For instance, four people had died in a helicopter crash in the Douira neighborhood of Algiers in August last year. While in June, a military helicopter crashed in the province of Naama, 700 kilometres southwest of Algiers, leaving one soldier dead.

In April 2015, a military helicopter crashed in the southern province of Illizi, killing two soldiers. In November 2014, an Algerian Air Force MIG-25 'Foxbat' fighter crashed, but the pilot managed to eject himself out of the plane and survived.

However, the most fatal plane crash was reported in February 2014, when a C-130 Hercules aircraft of the Algerian Air Force crashed in Oum El Bouaghi province, 400 kilometres east of Algiers, killing 77 soldiers.