Heavy snow and low clouds hampered search efforts Thursday for a passenger plane that disappeared in the Russian Far East with 97 people aboard.
The Aeroflot Tu-154 lost radio contact on a flight from Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, on the Pacific Island of Sakhalin, to Khabarovsk, on Russia's mainland, officials said. It was presumed to have crashed.Military, state and civilian aircraft searched for traces of the plane in the mountains east of Khabarovsk and in the sea.
At nightfall, the planes were called back because of darkness and poor weather conditions, the Emergency Situations Ministry said. Some air force planes continued searching, the Interfax news agency said.
The agency said villagers in Kopi, on the Sea of Japan, reported hearing the roar of airplane engines, leading rescuers to believe the plane went down over land.