Updated: Thu, 21 Jun 2012 09:55:28 GMT | By Agence France-Presse

Indonesian military plane crashes in Jakarta

An Indonesian military aircraft crashed into a military housing complex in the capital Jakarta on Thursday, killing six of the seven crew members on board, an air force spokesman said.


"Six out of the seven crew were killed and one was critically injured. That's all we know so far," spokesman Asman Yunus told AFP. "We've found no civilian victims so far."

The Fokker-27 crashed into a housing complex within the Halim Perdanakusuma military airport compound at 2:45 pm (0745 GMT) after taking off from the same airport at 1:10 pm.

"The aircraft was conducting training and there were no passengers aboard," Yunus said.

"The plane crashed on eight houses," Yunus told Metro TV, which showed footage of houses ablaze and what appeared to be the plane's wing sticking out from the roof of a brick house.

Yunus said the injured crew member had been taken to hospital and added that the military would look into the cause of the crash.

Indonesia has one of the world's poorest aviation safety records, and military aircraft crashes are relatively common.

In early May, a Russian Sukhoi jet on a promotional demonstration flight slammed into a dormant volcano in Java, killing all 45 aboard.

A New Zealand pilot and two Indonesians were killed in March after a helicopter chartered by the Indonesian arm of US mining company Freeport-McMoRan crashed in remote Papua province.

Indonesia is in the process of updating its ageing military aircraft and equipment, procuring Russian and American warplanes, boats for its navy and parts for its transport planes.

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