Emergency services have been searching for survivors from an Antonov An-26 twin-turboprop regional airliner that crashed in the sea as it prepared to land at Palana in the north of the Kamchatka peninsula on Russia’s Pacific coast. According to a Tuesday afternoon statement from Russian air transport agency Rosaviatsia, search teams found wreckage from the aircraft around 3 miles from the airport in Palana. However, around the same time, officials also told Russian state news agency RIA Novosti that they did not expect to find any of the 28 people on board alive, including 22 passengers and six crew members.
Russian prime minister Mikhail Mishustin ordered the country’s transport ministry to conduct an investigation into the accident. According to Rosaviatsia, the aircraft, operated by Kamchatka Aviation Enterprise, was due to land at Palana at 2.50 p.m. local time and air traffic controllers declared an emergency after losing contact with the crew. Early reports from the agency mentioned fog near the airport and broken clouds at around 1,000 feet.