Survivor of helicopter crash pleads for help by phone surrounded by 19 dead

The Mi-8 helicopter with 22 passengers and crew on board crashed 80 kilometres from Novy Urengoy in Yamalo-Nenets autonomous region. Only three survived, one of whom reported the horror in a dramatic phone call to emergency services in which he initially reported four were still alive. 

'Three are moaning, I am the fourth. And the rest do not even moan,' he said. 'One guy was able to climb out, he wanders around the helicopter, but he is kind of insane. I do not know where we are. Where is the help? Will there be any help? I cannot get out of the helicopter, my leg got caught.'

When rescuers reached the scene, only three were alive including Alexey Veremev. Earlier there had been reports that one of the pilots also contacted emergency services after the passenger. 

The injured passengers are in serious condition with head injuries, hypothermia and fractures. One has a fracture of the spine, another a broken hip and ribs. The crash took place in a 'thick fog' and the temperaturewas around minus 7C as survivors waited five hours for rescuers to arrive.

'Rescuers that arrived at the site have entered the damaged helicopter, where they found three people in serious condition,' said a law enforcement source as the operation to save the living passengers was underway. The other 19 passengers were killed,' the source said.

One injured passenger was taken to closest Urengoy settlement by a Skol company helicopter, while other two survivors receive medical assistance on the spot as their condition was assessed as critical.

It is understood the survivor flown to Urengoy was Alexey Veremev. The dead are mainly workers for a subsidiary of oil giant Rosneft. 

The Emergencies Ministry said reports came at 6:57 pm Moscow time on Friday that a Mi-8 helicopter crash landed in 80 km north-west of the Urengoy settlement in the Purovsky district of the Yamal-Nenets.

The helicopter was en route to Urengoy from the Suzunskoye oil field in Krasnoyarsk region. The Russian Investigative Committee (IC) opened a criminal case into the crash.

'Investigators consider three main causes of the crash - violation of flight security measures, equipment malfunction, unfavourable weather conditions,' said a press statement.