Cause of cargo plane crash in Lithuania remains unknown: Germany

BERLIN

Investigations are ongoing to determine the cause of a DHL cargo plane’s crash in Lithuania, German Interior Ministry said on Monday.

"No statements can yet be made about the cause of the accident," the ministry's deputy spokesman, Mehmet Ata, told reporters in Berlin. "Whether it was an accident or another cause led to the crash of the cargo plane is the subject of the current investigation."

The plane crashed in the courtyard near Vilnius Airport early Monday morning, killing one of the four crew members onboard. Local emergency services reported that people in a nearby residential building escaped unharmed.

Ata said German security authorities were in close contact with their Lithuanian counterparts, and were supporting the investigation to determine the cause of the plane crash in the Lithuanian capital.

The crash comes months after Germany's domestic intelligence agency BfV and federal criminal police office BKA warned about potential threats involving "unconventional incendiary devices" being sent through freight carriers.

However, Ata emphasized there was no evidence so far linking those earlier warnings to Monday's crash, and asked reporters to wait for the outcome of the ongoing investigation.

“It’s correct that our security authorities, the BKA and the BfV, warned of incendiary devices at the end of August, but so far there are no findings on possible connections with this plane crash, we have to wait for the investigation,” he said.

The crash occurred at around 5:30 local time, triggering a large fire that emergency responders extinguished. The Boeing 737-476(SF) plane, operated by DHL's Spanish contractor Swiftair, was flying from Germany’s Leipzig to Lithuania’s capital Vilnius. The crew member who died during the crash was a Spanish citizen, according to public service broadcaster LRT. The other three crew members included a Lithuanian, a German and another Spanish citizen.