Six people have died after a light aircraft operated by the medical charity Amref Flying Doctors crashed in Nairobi, Kenya, on Thursday.
According to Kiambu County Commissioner Henry Wafula, the Cessna plane — carrying doctors, nurses, and the pilot — took off from Wilson Airport en route to Hargeisa, Somalia, but went down just minutes later, striking a residential building in Nairobi’s Githurai area and bursting into flames.
Four people on board were killed, along with two others on the ground. Two additional people sustained serious injuries.
The Kenya Civil Aviation Authority reported that the plane lost both radio and radar contact with air traffic control three minutes after take-off. Amref confirmed there were four crew members and staff on board and said it was working closely with aviation authorities and emergency responders to determine the cause of the crash.
Kenya Defence Forces and National Police Service units were deployed to assist in search and recovery operations. Witness Patricia Kombo told the BBC she and her friends heard a loud bang and saw a flash of red light before smoke filled the air. “We then discovered it was a plane crash and saw the sunken hole the crash had created,” she said.
In a separate incident the same day, at least four people were killed when a train collided with a bus at a railway crossing near Naivasha town in central Kenya. The Kenya Pipeline Company, which owned the bus, said it was transporting staff finishing their morning shift from a training centre. All injured staff members were taken to hospital.
