Su-27 Flanker fighter crashes in Russia's Far East, 1 pilot dead

Su-27 Flanker fighter crashes in Russia's Far East, 1 pilot dead

MOSCOW, July 29 (RIA Novosti) - A Russian Su-27 Flanker air superiority fighter crashed on Tuesday in the Primorye Territory in Russia's Far East, killing one pilot, an Air Force spokesman said. The $35-mln combat aircraft crashed at 11.30 Moscow time (07.30 GMT) while conducting a routine training flight near an airfield 12 kilometers (7 miles) north of Ussuriisk. "One of the pilots was killed, and the other survived the crash," Lt. Colonel Vladimir Drik said, adding that no casualties or damage on the ground had been reported. The Su-27 Flanker and its variant, the Su-30 Flanker C, account for a major share of Russia's arms exports. Last year, Sukhoi exported 50 of these aircraft, accounting for 50% of Rosoboronexport's export revenues. An Su-27 fighter from the 6th Air Army flying from St. Petersburg to Kaliningrad, a Russian Baltic exclave surrounded by European Union states, crashed on September 15, 2005 on Lithuanian territory after a navigation system failure. Russia has compensated Lithuania $23,000 in damages for the accident. On July 27, 2002 a Ukrainian Air Force Su-27 of the Ukrainian Falcons crashed during an aerobatics presentation at Sknyliv airfield near Lviv, Ukraine, killing 85 people and injuring over 100 spectators. The crash remains the world's worst airshow disaster to date.