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A military transport plane with 125 people on board crashed shortly after taking off Monday in southwestern Colombia, causing an undetermined number of casualties, officials in the South American country said. At least 48 people were rescued alive, according to the Colombian Air Force.
Pedro Sanchez said on social media that the “tragic accident” occurred in Puerto Leguizamo, a remote municipality in the Amazonian province of Putumayo, which borders Peru and Ecuador. Images shared online by local media outlets show a black cloud of smoke rising from a field where the plane crashed, and a truck with soldiers rushing to the site.
Carlos Fernando Silva, the commander of Colombia’s Air Force, later issued a video saying that 125 people were on board the Hercules C-130 plane, including 114 passengers and 11 crew members. Silva said that at least 48 people were rescued alive as rescue efforts continued at the crash site.
Media outlets shared videos of soldiers being rushed from the site on motorcycles driven by local residents. “At this moment we do not know details” of the crash, Silva said, “except that the plane had a problem and went down about two kilometres from the airport.” Silva added that two planes, with 74 beds, had been sent to the area to fly the injured back to hospitals in Bogota and elsewhere.
“I hope there will be no deadly casualties in this accident that should have not occurred,” Colombian President Gustavo Petro wrote on X.
Petro seized on the accident to promote what he called his long-time campaign to modernize planes and other equipment used by his country’s military, saying those efforts have been blocked by “bureaucratic difficulties” and suggesting that some officials should be held accountable.
“If civilian or military administrative officials are not up to the challenge, they must be removed,” Petro said.
Sanchez wrote that the accident was “profoundly painful for the country,” adding that “we hope that our prayers can help to relieve some of the pain.”
