MOSCOW (Reuters) - A Russian pilot flew to the ranks of heroes on Tuesday after landing safely in an Airbus carrying more than 230 people in a cornfield outside Moscow after being hit by a collision with a flock of birds.
The Airbus "A321" belonging to the airline "Ural Airlines" carrying 226 passengers and crew of seven people, took off from the airport Zhukovsky in Moscow, according to the agency Rosaviatia air transport.
The plane crashed into the squadron shortly after take-off, and a number of birds were pulled into their engines, causing damage, and the pilot decided to land immediately, according to the AFP.
The agency said that the plane landed in a corn field, one kilometer from the runway, as the speed of landing was falling and its engines stopped and landing system stuck, as the following video shows:
The Russian authorities evacuated passengers by emergency ladders, some were taken to hospital and the rest went to the airport.
The Ministry of Health confirmed the transfer of 23 people to the hospital, including nine children, but did not indicate the presence of serious injuries among passengers.
She said one 69-year-old passenger suffered moderate injuries and needed to stay in hospital longer.
"Everything happened in a few seconds," Irina Osasheva told local television. "We took off and landed."
Svetlana Babina said the birds could have been heard from inside the plane and the engines had begun to produce "strange sounds."
"We have to salute the pilot, in these circumstances he landed as thinly as possible," she told RIA Novosti news agency.
"Everyone is alive. The pilot is a genius," Olga told the Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper, noting that the passengers applauded the pilot soon after landing.
Ekaterinburg-born pilot Damir Yusupov, 41, was widely praised for his speedy intuition.
"The crew of the Ural Airlines flight showed great skill and calm," said Yevgeny Kuyashev, governor of Yekaterinburg. "The pilot and his team saved 233 souls. They are heroes."
In turn, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov praised the "hero pilots" who landed the plane without crashing. Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev ordered the Ministry of Transport to allocate government rewards to the crew, stressing that what they have done "deserves the highest praise."
Russian media described the landing as a "miracle" and likened it to the landing of US pilot Chelsea "Sally" Salnberger in 2009 by a broken aircraft belonging to US lines in the Hudson River after colliding with a flock of birds.