Tehran, Feb 21 : A fighter jet crashed into a stadium in a city in northwest Iran, the country’s state-run news agency reported Monday. The crash killed two pilots and a civilian.
Gen. Reza Yousefi, commander of the air base in Tabriz, said the crashed jet had been used for training and suffered a technical problem on its final flight.
In an effort to avoid crashing into the residential area, the pilots guided the jet to the stadium, he said. The report quoted Yousefi as saying, “Pilots sacrificed themselves, they could (have) used the ejection system, but they refused to do it.”
Iran’s air force has an assortment of U.S.-made military aircraft purchased before the 1979 Islamic Revolution. It also has Russian-made MiG and Sukhoi planes. Decades of Western sanctions have made it hard to maintain the aging fleet.
