One crew dead, three survive as cargo plane crashes near Vilnius airport

Helen Regan, Edward Szekeres, Sandi Sidhu and Manveena Suri, CNN

(CNN) — One crew member was killed after a cargo plane crashed early Monday on the outskirts of Vilnius Airport in Lithuania, skidded into a house and burst into flames.

Remarkably, three others on board the flight, including the pilot, survived the crash, along with 12 members of the building who were safely evacuated, according to local authorities.

The cargo plane flying from Leipzig, Germany was due to land at Vilnius Airport when it crashed a few kilometers from the runway.

The plane skidded on the ground for several hundred meters before hitting a residential home, Renatas Pozela, chief of the Fire and Rescue Department, told reporters.

“One crew member was found without any signs of life,” said Vilmantas Vitkauskas, head of the country’s National Crisis Management Center, according to public broadcaster LRT.

Vitkauskas later said at a press conference that it was “too early to make any conclusions” as to what caused the crash and the “circumstances and causes” were being investigated.

Footage from a nearby security camera shows the plane descending, before dipping out of view behind a building. Moments later, a large fireball can be seen in the sky rising from behind the building, followed by a plume of black smoke.

At least two crew members were taken to hospital, authorities said, and all four on board are now accounted for. There were no reported casualties on the ground.

The incident happened at about 5.30 a.m. local time (10 p.m. ET) near Zirniu Street, south of the capital, an airport spokesperson confirmed to CNN on Monday.

“The city’s special services are working at the scene and leading the rescue efforts, as well as crews from the Vilnius Airport Fire Service,” the airport spokesperson said.

The spokesperson said due to “ongoing rescue work near Vilnius Airport,” departures for several aircraft had been delayed but that all scheduled flights were still taking off.

The cargo plane that crashed was a Swift Air aircraft “operating under contract for DHL,” the logistics company said in a statement to CNN.

DHL said the plane “made a forced landing about one kilometer from VNO Airport.” It confirmed four people were onboard and said “the status of the crew is still being clarified.”

“The cause of the accident is still unknown, and an investigation is underway,” DHL said.

According to the Vilnius mayor, Valdas Benkunskas, the plane narrowly missed hitting the house directly, crashing instead into the nearby courtyard, LRT reported.

Firefighters could be seen pouring water onto the building as a large plume of smoke billowed into the sky.

A spokesperson for the National Crisis Management Center told Reuters there was currently no data to suggest that there had been an explosion before the plane crashed.

The head of the Lithuanian Police, Arūnas Paulauskas, said the incident was “most likely due to a technical fault or a human error” but that terrorism “cannot be ruled out,” according to LRT.

“This is one of the versions of the crash, which will be investigated and checked. There is a lot of work ahead. The collection of evidence can take the whole week, there will not be quick answers,” Paulauskas reportedly said.

This story has been updated with additional developments.

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CNN’s Kathleen Magramo contributed reporting.