A Russian passenger jet with at least 170 people aboard crashed in Ukraine on Tuesday after sending a distress signal, emergency officials said.
The Pulkovo airlines Tupolev 154, en route from the Russian Black Sea resort of Anapa to St. Petersburg, disappeared from radar screens over Ukraine about 2:30 p.m., officials said.
Minutes later, the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry said wreckage from the plane was found on the ground.
The Interfax news agency quoted Ukrainian Emergency Situations Ministry spokesman Igor Krol as saying a fire broke out on the plane at 32,800 feet and that the crew decided to try to make an emergency landing. However, it also quoted Russian aviation official Alexander Neradko as saying that the plane might have run into strong turbulence.
Russian Emergency Situations Ministry spokeswoman Irina Andriyanova said 30 bodies had been found. She said there were 171 people aboard: 160 passengers, including six children, and 11 crew members. Ukrainian officials said there were 160 passengers and 10 crew members on board. The discrepancy could not immediately be explained.
The plane disappeared from radar screens two minutes after the crew sent a distress signal, said Yulia Stadnikova, another Russian spokeswoman.
Rescuers were working at the site of the crash, found near the Ukrainian city of Donetsk, about 400 miles east of Kiev, Ukrainian officials said.
Pulkovo airlines, among Russia’s largest carriers, is based in St. Petersburg.
It was the third major plane crash in the region this year, and came less than two months after at least 124 people died when an Airbus A-310 of the Russian carrier S7 skidded off a runway and burst into flames on July 9 in the Siberian city of Irkutsk.
On May 3, an A-320 of the Armenian airline Armavia crashed into the Black Sea while trying to land in the Russian resort city of Sochi in rough weather, killing all 113 people aboard.
Russian-made Tu-154s are widely used by Russian airlines for many regional flights.