ANKARA: A Syrian military pilot whose aircraft crashed in Turkey near the countries’ border is in hospital having been found after a nine-hour search, the Anadolu news agency said on Sunday.
Dogan news agency said the pilot had been found around 40km from the wreckage. According to the Turkish report, the pilot was recovered during an air and ground search.
He was first taken to a gendarmerie base and then to the hospital. The plane went down Saturday night in the Turkish province of Hatay.
Anadolu, a state-run agency, did not give further details on the pilot’s health but said he was flying alone when the plane crashed.
A Syrian military source quoted by state television on Saturday said: “contact was lost with a military aircraft on a reconnaissance mission near the Turkish border”.
It gave no details. It was unclear why the aircraft had crashed, whether it had been attacked or suffered technical failure.
However, the Syrian rebel group Ahrar al Sham said that it had shot down a government plane “as it was overflying Idlib province [in northwestern Syria] and carrying out air strikes”.
Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim, quoted by Anadolu, said earlier that the cause of the crash was unknown, but he pointed to poor weather conditions at the time.
