Colombian military plane crashes killing 66 people, four missing

A Colombian military plane carrying 128 passengers crashed during a takeoff on Monday (23 March) from Puerto Leguizamo, on the border with Peru, killing 66 people, as rescuers shuttled dozens of survivors to nearby hospitals and searched for four who were still missing, according to a top official.

The Lockheed Martin-built Hercules C-130 transport plane was carrying 11 Air Force members, 115 army personnel and two national police officers, according to Hugo Alejandro Lopez, head of the nation's armed forces.

The plane was believed to have suffered an impact near the end of the runway as it was taking off, firefighter Eduardo San Juan Callejas told Caracol, with a wing of the plane later clipping a tree as it was plummeting.

The crash caused the plane to catch fire and detonate some sort of explosive devices on board, he added.

The death toll was nearly double that of the previous figure given by authorities, who continued search and recovery efforts at the site of the deadly crash.

Residents of the remote area were the first to pull out survivors, with videos showing men speeding down a dirt road with wounded soldiers on the back of their motorcycles.

Military vehicles later arrived, though authorities said the crash site was difficult to reach, impeding rescue efforts. Lopez said that 57 of the survivors had been hospitalised, with 30 of them in non-serious condition at a military clinic.

President Gustavo Petro, in the twilight of his administration, on Monday criticised bureaucratic obstacles for delaying his plans to modernise the military.

"I will grant no further delays; it is the lives of our young people that are at stake," he said in a post on X. "If civilian or military administrative officials are not up to this challenge, they must be removed."

Several candidates in Colombia's upcoming 31 May presidential election offered condolences and called for an investigation.

A spokesperson for Lockheed Martin said the company was committed to helping Colombia as it investigates the incident.

The tail number of the plane matches that of the first of three planes delivered by the U.S. to Colombia in recent years.

Hercules C-130 planes were first launched in the 1950s and Colombia acquired its first models in the late 1960s. It has more recently modernised some older C-130s with newer models sent from the U.S. under a provision that allows for the transfer of used or surplus military equipment.

Hercules C-130s are frequently used in Colombia to transport troops as part of the military's operations amid a six-decade-long internal conflict that has claimed more than 450,000 lives.

At the end of February, another Hercules C-130 belonging to the Bolivian Air Force crashed in the populous city of El Alto, barely missing a residential block.

More than 20 people died in that incident and another 30 were injured, and banknotes from the plane's cargo scattered around the crash site, prompting clashes between residents and security forces.

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