A Colombian military aircraft transporting 125 troops and crew members crashed shortly after taking off from southern Colombia Monday morning, killing one person and injuring at least 77 others, according to the Colombian authorities.
Gen. Carlos Fernando Silva Rueda, the commander of Colombian Air Force, said the military was still investigating the cause of the accident.
“At this time we don’t have any more details except that as soon as it took off, the airplane suffered a problem and descended toward the ground, a couple of kilometers from the airport,” the general said in a video statement.
The Colombian Air Force identified the plane as a C-130 Hercules, a large, four-engine turboprop aircraft typically used to transport heavy loads of cargo, military personnel and military vehicles.
The aircraft had taken off from Puerto Leguízamo, a riverside town in the Putumayo region, on Colombia’s border with Peru, at 9:50 a.m. before it crashed. There were 114 troops on board and 11 crew members, officials said.
In a message posted on social media Monday afternoon, President Gustavo Petro said that the authorities were still determining the condition of dozens of people. The mayor of Puerto Leguízamo, Luis Emilio Bustos, said that at least 14 people who arrived at the town’s hospital were in “grave condition.”
Mr. Petro thanked the residents in the Putumayo area who rushed to the crash site on motorcycles and on foot to help those injured.
“That is how a homeland is built,” he said on social media, adding that locals “went all the way to the airport runway and brought water and love to the boys.”
A video released by Noticias Caracol, a Colombian news outlet, seems to show the aircraft coming down over a field as a resident screams, “Oh, it fell!”
“I express my most sincere condolences to the families of those affected and, in respect for their pain, I call for avoiding speculation until official information is available,” Pedro Arnulfo Sánchez, the defense minister, said in a post on social media.
Videos posted on social media by El Tiempo, the largest newspaper in Colombia, showed a large fire in a field and a chaotic scene as residents on motorbikes cleared the way for soldiers rushing to the scene, on foot and in trucks.
The crash occurred in an isolated pocket of Colombia on the banks of the Putumayo River, which divides northern Peru from Colombia. Mr. Bustos, the mayor, said that the injured would have to be airlifted to major hospitals elsewhere in the country.
“It’s very far,” he said. “It’s a remote town in a rural zone, and access is very limited.”
The Colombian military said it had deployed helicopters and an aircraft that could airlift as many as 50 people.
A video of the seeming crash site posted by Semana, a Colombian magazine, showed fire and smoke rising from what appeared to be remains of the aircraft. Another video posted by the magazine showed at least three soldiers, one of whom had blood on his face, being driven in the back of motorcycles by local residents.
Genevieve Glatsky contributed reporting from Bogotá, Colombia.
Luis Ferré-Sadurní is a reporter for The Times based in Bogotá, Colombia
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