At least 19 people died when a Sudanese military transport plane crashed into a residential neighborhood on the outskirts of Khartoum, the army-aligned health ministry said Wednesday.
The Antonov aircraft went down on Tuesday night near the Wadi Seidna air base in Omdurman, one of the army’s largest military hubs northwest of the capital. The crash, which occurred during takeoff, killed and injured both military personnel and civilians, according to the Sudanese army.
Witnesses reported a loud explosion, with several homes damaged and power outages affecting nearby neighborhoods. Emergency teams rushed injured civilians, including children, to a nearby hospital as search efforts continued for bodies under the rubble.
A military source, speaking anonymously to AFP, attributed the crash to a technical malfunction.
The tragedy came just a day after the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) claimed responsibility for downing a Russian-made Ilyushin aircraft over Nyala, South Darfur’s capital.
The incidents mark a dangerous escalation in the nearly two-year conflict between army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and his former deputy, RSF commander Mohamed Hamadan Daglo.
The conflict, which began in April 2023, has devastated Sudan, leaving tens of thousands dead, displacing millions, and plunging the country into a severe humanitarian crisis, with no clear resolution in sight.
