Secret services were today probing the cause of a DHL cargo plane crash in Lithuania, which killed the pilot, after several recent “covert Russian sabotage operations” involving bombs at warehouses – including in the UK.
Three other crew members were rescued and hospitalised with injuries following the crash in the East European country’s capital, Vilnius.
An explosion lit up the early morning sky in the Lithuanian capital and triggered a major fire, which forced emergency services to rush to the scene.
But the nation’s secret services are now believed to be probing possible links between the crash and recent Russian sabotage attacks.
For the last few months, several mysterious explosions have occurred at DHL warehouses both in the UK in Birmingham and Leipzig in Germany, amid growing fears of a Kremlin covert sabotage operation.
It is feared that the small devices’ real targets may have been DHL aircraft flying into Western destinations.
Bombs were disguised as massage devices filled with flammable substances instead of electronic components.
Experts concluded that the attacks, which caused small fires at the DHL warehouses in Birmingham and Leipzig, had been designed to “create havoc”.
But it was also feared that the intention was not to target the logistics centres but rather passenger and cargo planes carrying hazardous packages.
Lithuanian intelligence services were at the scene of today’s crash of a Boeing 737-400 of cargo airline Swiftair, which DHL leases.
There was no immediate reason given for the crash as investigations continued.
The 31-year-old Boeing 737 cargo aircraft was en route from Leipzig to Vilnius, the Lithuanian capital.
It hit a two-storey residential building on Žirnių Street at around 5:30am.
A dozen residents of the house where the plane crashed are alive and were evacuated. Fire crews from nearby Vilnius Airport arrived at the scene.
Firefighters were seen tackling smoke coming from a building 1.3 km (0.8 mile) north of the airport runway.
The cause of the crash is unknown, but Lithuanian authorities confirmed they had launched an investigation.
DHL said it owned the plane and had made an “emergency landing”. It did not comment on the previous sabotage attacks.
The head of Lithuania’s firefighting and emergency services unit, Renatas Pozela, said the plane was due to land at Vilnius airport and “crashed a few kilometres away”.
One person, the pilot, in the four-member crew died, he added.
Mr Pozela said a nearby house was “slightly damaged” and the infrastructure near it caught fire, but all residents evacuated safely.
An airport spokesperson said the plane was a Boeing 737-400, and weather conditions had been fine at the time of the crash.
