A Silk Way Airlines Antonov AN-12 freighter flying out of Camp Dwyer in southern Afghanistan’s Helmand province to an unspecified Afghan destination crashed after suffering an engine failure on take off at 19:00 local time, Wednesday night.

Of the nine persons onboard, seven perished in the resulting impact while two Ukrainian crew members survived with serious injuries and  were taken to a hospital in Kandahar in critical condition.

Azerbaijan’s Accident Investigation Commission has dispatched an investigating team to Camp Dwyer  to investigate as Silk Way is based in Azerbaijan. The crew consisted of an Uzbekistan citizen (Captain), three Ukrainians and five Azerbaijanis.

Silk Way Airlines is the charter operator of the Silk Way Group which includes scheduled cargo carrier, Silk Way West Airlines. Silk Way Airlines operates charters into areas not well-served by scheduled cargo services on behalf of both governmental and non-governmental clients. It operates a fleet of three Antonov AN-12s, three B747-400F, three B747-8F (with two more slated for delivery) and seven Ilyushin IL-76TD. The carrier also has a firm order for 10 Antonov AN-178s.

In July 2011, a Silk Way Airlines cargo plane crashed into a mountain in eastern Afghanistan, killing all nine people on board.