DUSHANBE (TCA) — Five people have died in a helicopter accident in eastern Tajikistan, including three Russian mountaineers and two Tajik members of the helicopter crew, RFE/RL’s Tajik Service reported.
Umeda Yusufi, a spokeswoman for Tajikistan’s State Emergency Committee, said on August 13 that a Tajik pilot and 12 mountaineers, mainly from Russia, survived what she described as a crash-landing in the Pamir Mountains.
Bad weather conditions might have been the cause of the accident, according to Yusufi.
The Russian Embassy in Tajikistan has not confirmed the nationality of the mountaineers.
Tajik state media reported earlier that the Mi-8 helicopter was carrying 13 Russians, one Belarusian, and one Spanish mountaineer after they reached the Ismoili Somoni Peak, the highest mountain in Tajikistan and the former Soviet Union (approximately 24,600 feet above sea level).
The accident is another blow on Tajikistan’s tourism industry, following the killing of four foreign cyclist tourists in the Islamic State-claimed attack on a remote mountain road on July 29. The attack claimed the lives of two Americans, a Dutchman, and a Swiss citizen. Three other foreigners — one Dutch, one Swiss, and one French — were injured.
Tajik President Emomali Rahmon declared 2018 as the Year of Tourism and National Crafts in Tajikistan in a bid to boost incoming tourism in the Central Asian country.
