A DHL cargo plane has crashed into a house near Lithuania’s capital, killing at least one of four people on board.
Lithuania’s rescue chief Renatas Pozela said the Boeing 737-400 crashed shortly before landing at Vilnius airport early on Monday morning, with authorities suggesting terror could not be discounted as they investigate the cause.
“It fell a few kilometers before the airport, it just skidded for a few hundred meters, its debris somewhat caught a residential house,” Mr Pozela said.
“Residential infrastructure around the house was on fire, and the house was slightly damaged, but we managed to evacuate people.”
One person onboard was confirmed dead, while another three were injured, officials said. The person who was killed was a member of the flight crew but not a pilot, officials said. Firefighters freed two pilots from the cockpit, one of whom was more seriously injured, according to police.
All of the people in the house survived, a spokesperson for the governmental National Crisis Management Centre said, adding that there was nothing currently to suggest that an explosion preceded the crash.
Police said twelve people were evacuated from the house.
Firefighters were seen pouring water onto a smoking building some 1.3 kilometres north of the airport runway. A large police and ambulance presence was seen nearby and several nearby major streets were cordoned off.
The Lithuanian airport authority identified the aircraft as a DHL cargo plane arriving from Leipzig, Germany. Flight-tracking data from FlightRadar24 showed the aircraft made a turn to the north of the airport, lining up for landing, before crashing a little more than 1.5km short of the runway.
Authorities have not yet identified a cause for the crash, which happened just before 5.30am local time. Weather at the airport was around freezing temperature, with clouds before sunrise and winds around 18mph.
The aircraft was operated by Swiftair, a Madrid-based contractor, which could not be immediately reached for comment.
A DHL spokesperson confirmed that an aircraft being operated by third-party carrier Swiftair under contract for DHL “made a forced landing” close to Vilnius airport, adding: “The cause of the accident is still unknown and an investigation is already underway.”
The Boeing 737 was 31 years old, which is considered by experts to be an older aircraft but is not unusual for cargo flights.
The possibility of terrorism cannot be discounted, but there is currently no evidence to suggest it is to blame for the crash, Lithuania’s counter-intelligence chief Darius Jauniskis said.
“We cannot reject the possibility of terrorism ... But at the moment we can’t make attributions or point fingers, because we don’t have such information,” he said.
The crash comes as Germany investigates several fires caused by incendiary devices hidden inside parcels at a warehouse in Leipzig earlier this year, the country’s prosecutor general said in October.
British counter-terrorism police have also said they are investigating possible Russian involvement in an incident in Birmingham where a package caught fire at a DHL warehouse, and are liaising with other European law enforcement agencies to see if there was a connection with similar incidents elsewhere.
Polish prosecutors have since arrested four people in connection with the Birmingham fires, and charged them with participating in sabotage or terrorist operations on behalf of a foreign intelligence agency. Prosecutors warned the action had been a test run for future attacks on the United States.
In the months after the fires, intelligence agency chiefs, including the heads of MI6 and MI5, have warned that their Russian counterparts were carrying out a range of attacks in Europe, including arson and sabotage.
Lithuania’s prime minister Ingrida Simonyte cautioned against speculation, saying investigators needed time to do their job.
“The responsible agencies are working diligently,” Ms Simonyte said. “I urge everyone to have confidence in the investigating authorities’ ability to conduct a thorough and professional investigation within an optimal timeframe.
“Only these investigations will uncover the true causes of the incident – speculation and guesswork will not help establish the truth.”
Additional reporting by agencies
