Tragedy Strikes Turkish Military Plane in Georgia
All 20 personnel on board a Turkish military cargo plane that crashed in Georgia on Tuesday were killed, according to the country’s defense minister Yasar Guler. The C-130 aircraft was en route from Azerbaijan to Turkey when it crashed in the eastern Georgian municipality of Sighnaghi, near the border with Azerbaijan. The incident occurred shortly after the plane took off from Ganja, and authorities are still investigating the cause of the crash.
A Turkish accident investigation team arrived at the crash site and began inspecting the wreckage in coordination with Georgian authorities, as reported by a source at the Turkish defense ministry. Georgia’s Interior Minister Gela Geladze stated that the remains of 18 victims have been recovered so far, with ongoing efforts to locate the other two.
Geladze also mentioned that further details about the accident will be released “in stages.” He explained that due to military sensitivities and in coordination with Ankara, information from the ongoing investigation cannot be promptly disclosed. The wreckage of the aircraft was spread across a plain that includes farmland and is surrounded by hills. Debris was scattered across multiple locations, according to reports from Turkish media outlets covering the site.
On Tuesday, a Turkish state-run agency quoted the Georgian aviation authority as stating that contact with the plane was lost a few minutes after it entered Georgian airspace. The plane had not issued a distress signal, according to the report.
C-130 military cargo planes are widely used by Turkey’s armed forces for transporting personnel and handling logistical operations. Military flights between Azerbaijan and Turkey are routine, given the close ties and military cooperation between the two countries.
Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev and Georgia’s Foreign Minister Maka Botchorishvili extended their condolences to their Turkish counterparts following the crash. “We are deeply shocked,” Aliyev said in a message, as reported by a Turkish state-run agency.
The US Ambassador to Turkey, Tom Barrack, extended his condolences and reaffirmed Washington’s solidarity with Ankara. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte also offered his sympathies and thanked the late NATO personnel for their service.
There was no immediate information available on funeral arrangements for the remains of the 18 personnel that have been located and identified. Turkish media reported that the plane was manufactured in 1968 and initially served in Saudi Arabia before being added to the Turkish Armed Forces inventory in 2010.
The plane belonged to the 12th Air Base Command in the central Turkish city of Kayseri, where it departed on Monday to Ganja to pick up personnel. It was scheduled to return to Turkey to the northern city of Merzifon.