In brief
The cargo plane operated by Swiftair for DHL met with tragedy shortly after taking off from Leipzig Airport.
A DHL-operated cargo plane tragically crashed near Vilnius airport early Monday, resulting in one deceased and three others injured. Emergency services are actively searching for a fourth individual who may still be unaccounted for. According to local authorities, the aircraft went down while making its final landing approach and impacted near a residential area. The cargo plane, managed by the Spanish airline Swiftair, had taken off from DHL's hub at Leipzig Airport shortly after 03:00 local time (02:00 GMT). The crash occurred roughly 90 minutes later. Emergency responders confirmed that all twelve occupants of the nearby house were safely evacuated, avoiding further casualties. However, firefighters were seen addressing smoke emitting from a structure approximately 1.3 kilometers (0.8 miles) north of the runway.Flight operations at Vilnius airport remain ongoing despite the incident, as confirmed by data from flight-tracking source Flightradar24. The precise cause of the crash is not yet known, prompting Lithuanian authorities to initiate a thorough investigation into the incident.
