Bodies of aid workers killed in helicopter crash recovered

US-led coalition forces in Afghanistan have recovered the bodies of seven Turkmen aid workers, most of them doctors, who were killed in a helicopter crash in eastern Afghanistan in January, the US military said in the capital, Kabul, on Sunday. A Turkmenistan Airlines helicopter, chartered by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) for a humanitarian mission in the aftermath of the 8 October 2005 earthquake in neighbouring Pakistan, disappeared over Afghanistan on 20 January. Villagers found the wreckage on a steep and rocky mountain top in Kapisa province, about 60 km northeast of Kabul, on 1 June. Some of the victims were still strapped to their seats, the US military statement explained. “We sent an elite high altitude rescue and recovery team to the crash site, consisting of Turkmen recovery experts and coalition ground forces, to facilitate the investigation and recovery,” US Gen Benjamin Freakley said. Due to the high altitude and the remote location of the crash site, Turkmen officials initially travelled to Kabul to request assistance from US forces for the recovery mission, the US army said. The remains of the victims were transferred to proper caskets at Bagram airfield located north of Kabul, and then flown to the capital where they were subsequently returned to Turkmenistan and their families, the US military stated. The recovery team spent nearly four and a half hours at the crash site to recover the bodies of the aid workers, working at a height of over 4,000 m, it said. The helicopter was one of several international aircraft that provided vital rescue and relief operation after last year’s 7.6 earthquake that killed more than 75,000 people in mountainous northwestern Pakistan and Pakistani-administered Kashmir.