Small plane crashes in Romania, pilot dies

One of the two pilots in a small plane crash in Romania's western county of Cluj died before the rescue teams reached the crash site over six hours after the accident. "The pilot has died, his body was imprisoned in the debris of the crashed aircraft," said a local official, adding that the other six people who were on the plane were brought down by rescuers to the area where a road ambulance can be taken. A woman resident doctor was resurrected, receiving specialized medicalcare. "She is in critical condition," medical sources were quoted as saying. The first team of rescuers arrived in the place where the plane crashed at 22:40 local time, six hours after the accident. "More than 70 fire rescuers from counties Cluj, Bihor, Mures and Alba are involved in search and rescue of people injured in the accident aircraft," read a press release of the State Inspectorate for Emergency Situations. "They were joined by mountain gendarmerie, police, teams of rescuers and employees of the Apuseni Mountains National Park," said the press release. Rescue teams moved on foot to the place where the accident was reported, but conditions on the ground are very cumbersome due to snow that at times exceeds 50 inches, wooded, sloping and low visibility. According to earlier reports citing medical sources, all seven people on board were conscious after the accident, but suffered fractures and wounds, and most of them can not move. Cluj police spokesman Adriana Vornicu said a person who was in the accident plane reported the unfortunate event by calling 112 emergency services and said that the plane crashed in a mountainous area. The airplane that transported a medical team crashed on Monday afternoon in a forested area in the county of Cluj. The medical team was on its way to the northwestern city of Oradea to perform a surgical resection of a liver that had to be taken to Bucharest for organ donation. The accident occurred in an inaccessible wooded area in the village Belis, the official Agerpres news agency reported, citing Deputy Mayor Mariana Ciumafai. The plane, a Britten-Norman Islander (BN-2) belonging to the National Transplant Agency, took off from Bucharest Baneasa Airport and had two pilots and five medical personnel on board. The cause of the mishap has yet to be known.