WARSAW, Poland — A Polish military plane carrying 20 passengers and crew crashed in northwestern Poland, killing all aboard, including a brigadier general, Prime Minister Donald Tusk said today.
The plane was approaching an air base at Miroslawiec shortly after 7 p.m. Wednesday when it went down in a forest in northwestern Poland. Officials initially said seven were confirmed dead.
“Soldiers, husbands, and fathers have died, and that is the most tragic result of this catastrophe,” Tusk said. He called it a “huge loss for the Polish air force.”
The plane was approaching an air base at Miroslawiec shortly after 7 p.m. when it crashed, base spokesman Maj. Bogdan Ziolkowski said.
The aircraft, a Spanish-built CASA C-295M military transport plane, was about a mile from the airstrip when it clipped trees on its approach, crashed into a wooded area and burst into flames, Ziolkowski said. The passengers were officers who had attended an annual one-day conference in Warsaw on air safety, he said.
