A military training aircraft crashed shortly after take-off on Monday, crashing into a school in the capital, Dhaka.
A Bangladesh Air Force training aircraft crashed into a school in the country’s capital city of Dhaka on Monday, killing at least 20 people.
More than 170 people were injured as the F-7 BGI training jet crashed into the Milestone School and College, in the city’s northern Uttara neighborhood.
The pilot, named as Flight Lieutenant Md. Toukir Islam, was among those killed as the plane hit a two-storey building, said the country’s military in a statement.
The jet had taken off from Dhaka’s AK Khandker Air Force Base for a training flight shortly after 1 p.m. local time, but crashed minutes later due to a mechanical fault, said the statement from the Inter-Services Public Relations Directorate (ISPR). The pilot had attempted to steer the aircraft away from densely populated areas, it added.
Muhammad Yunus, the leader of the country’s interim government, offered his “deep condolences” over the “tragic accident”, adding in a social media post that the cause of the crash would be investigated.
