At least 66 killed in Colombia military plane crash

Bogota: At least 66 people have been killed in a military transport plane crash in southern Colombia, the country's armed forces chief said on Tuesday.

The airplane was carrying at least 128 people on board, mostly soldiers, and crashed shortly after departing from Puerto Leguizamo, a municipality in an Amazonian province that borders Ecuador and Peru.

Dozens more were injured in the crash too.

Colombian news outlets published videos of local residents rushing to the site of the crash that occurred Monday, with the Colombian president later having thanked first responders.

"That is how a homeland is built, I thank the fathers and mothers who ran across the distance to the crashed Hercules plane to save the children of other mothers and fathers," Gustavo Petro posted to X on Monday.

Petro calls for modernising aircraft
Petro also seized on the accident to promote what he called his longtime campaign to modernise planes and other equipment used by his country's military.

"I will grant no further delays, it is the lives of our young people ​that are at stake," he said. "If civilian or military administrative officials are not up to this challenge, they must be removed."

Cause of Colombia plane crash under investigation
The cause of the plane crash, a Lockheed Martin Hercules ‌C-130 aircraft, is still under investigation. 

The head of Colombia's armed forces, General Hugo Alejandro Lopez Barreto, said there was no indication that the plane was attacked by rebel groups that operate near Puerto Leguizamo.
Bolivia Air Force aircraft C-130 crashed last month 

Another Hercules C-130 belonging to the Bolivian Air Force crashed last month in the populous city of El Alto in western Bolivia.

More than 20 people died in that accident and another 30 were injured.

Banknotes from the plane's cargo scattered around the city, having prompted clashes between residents and security forces.