Six people have died after a medical charity aircraft crashed in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, shortly after departing for Somalia.
It comes just a day after Ghana mourned the loss of eight people, including two senior government ministers, in a military helicopter crash that shocked the West African nation.
The Cessna light aircraft, operated by Amref Flying Doctors, crashed and burst into flames in a residential building in Nairobi’s Githurai area on Thursday afternoon.
Four people aboard the plane were killed, including medical personnel and the pilot, whilst two people on the ground also lost their lives, according to Kiambu County Commissioner Henry Wafula. Two others sustained serious injuries in the incident.
The aircraft had taken off from Wilson Airport bound for Hargeisa in Somalia when it lost both radio and radar contact with air traffic control just three minutes after departure, the Kenya Civil Aviation Authority confirmed.
“At this time, we are cooperating fully with relevant aviation authorities and emergency response teams to establish the facts surrounding the situation,” said Amref CEO Stephen Gitau in a statement.
The plane was carrying four crew members and Amref staff when the tragedy occurred. Investigators have been dispatched to determine the cause of the crash.
Eyewitness Patricia Kombo told the BBC she was travelling in the area when the incident happened. “We heard a loud bang and a red flash ahead of us. Before I could take my phone to record, the flash was gone and smoke was billowing,” she said.
“We then heard people screaming and running, so we ended our trip. We discovered it was a plane crash and saw the sunken hole the crash had created in the ground.”
The Kenya Defence Forces and National Police Service have deployed teams to conduct search and recovery operations at the crash site.
Amref Flying Doctors operates medical evacuation and healthcare services across East Africa, providing crucial emergency medical transport to remote areas.
In a separate incident on Thursday, at least four people died when a train collided with a bus at a railway crossing near Naivasha town in central Kenya, according to the Red Cross.
The Kenya Pipeline Company confirmed the bus was carrying staff finishing their morning shift at a training centre, with all injured personnel taken to hospital for treatment.
The twin tragedies have highlighted ongoing concerns about transport safety in Kenya, where aviation and railway incidents have occurred with troubling regularity in recent years.
