Romanian military helicopter crashes with ten on board, eight dead

A Romanian military helicopter crashed on Friday morning on the borderline between Sibiu and Mures counties, in the center of Romania, with ten people on board. Eight of the soldiers on board died and the other two were injured in the accident. The two survivors were taken to Bucharest by another helicopter, for treatment at the Burn Hospital. All the ten soldiers were pilots, military personnel, and medical staff of the Romanian air force Base 71 in Campia Turzii. Defence minister Mircea Dusa and deputy prime minister Gabriel Oprea both went to the place of the crash. The journalist who went to the site of the crash reported that a pile of scrap and smoking ashes are all that’s left of the IAR-330 Puma helicopter which crashed, according to Mediafax newswire. This is the second serious aviation accident this year, after a plane carrying medical personnel and transplant organs crashed in January this year in the Apuseni Mountains. Pilot Adrian Iovan and a medical student died in that crash. editor@romania-insider.com