Russian Military Jet Crashes After Takeoff in Syria, Kills Crew
The Sukhoi-24 attack aircraft, codenamed Fencer by the NATO military alliance, was heading out on a combat mission.
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A Russian military jet crashed while taking off from Russia's Hmeymim air base in Syria on Tuesday in an incident that killed its two-man crew, Russia's Defence Ministry said, Russian news agencies reported.
The Sukhoi-24 attack aircraft, codenamed Fencer by the NATO military alliance, was heading out on a combat mission, but its crew failed to eject after the plane veered off the runway, the ministry was cited as saying.
Russia has used the Hmeymim base in Latakia Province to launch air strikes against opponents of President Bashar al-Assad since it first intervened in the Syrian conflict in September 2015.
Russia lost two other planes - a Sukhoi-33 and a MiG-29 - off the coast of Syria last year in accidents involving its sole aircraft carrier, the Admiral Kuznetsov.
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