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Russian helicopter crashes in the Arctic, rescuers lose hope for missing crew

A Russian helicopter, met with an accident at sea in Norway’s Svalbard archipelago in the Arctic yesterday, carrying 8 crew members all of them Russian nationals. The crew abroad the chopper are reported missing.

Chances of survival were fading rapidly, with air and water temperatures in the region currently around zero degrees Celsius (32 Fahrenheit).

Rescuers were in a “race against the clock,” rescue chief Tore Hongset told. 

The aircraft went down in the afternoon two or three kilometres from Barentsburg, a Russian mining community in the archipelago, the rescue services said.

No contact had been made with the chopper before it went down or immediately after it was reported down.

Two Norwegian helicopters and several rescue vessels were dispatched to the scene.

So far, only two oil patches have been detected in the area, but it is not known if they come from the Russian helicopter. “We’re continuing the search until we’ve cleared this up,” he said. 

Visibility in the area was reduced because of snow and darkness, which falls early this time of year at this latitude.

The aircraft was a Russian Mil Mi-8 based permanently near Barentsburg.

In 2008, another Mil Mi-8 crashed near Barentsburg, killing three of its nine occupants. Yet another crash near Pyramiden of the same type of helicopter left two dead in 1991.  

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