A U.S. Navy helicopter with 18 personnel on board crashed at Bahrain's airport just seconds after take-off Tuesday, a U.S. Embassy source told Gulf News daily.
Only one of the six-member crew of the MH-53 Minesweeper helicopter was slightly wounded, while the others, including 12 passengers, were safely evacuated by an airport civil defense team, the source added.
The helicopter, in a usual flight to a U.S. Navy Arabian Gulf-based ship, "took off, hovered and then just crashed. We don't have any idea as yet about what went wrong," said the source, who works for the embassy's public affairs.
Bahrain News Agency (BNA) has quoted airport sources as saying that the plane caught fire due to a fuel leak. However, Gulf News' sources denied this. (Albawaba.com)
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