By Malaysia Airlines posted on its social media platforms at around midnight that its flight MH17 went missing when it was flying over Ukraian airspace
“Malaysia Airlines has lost contact of flight MH17 operating from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur on 17 July 2014. The last known position was over Ukrainian airspace.”
Footage of what seems to be the aftermath of the airplane crash was shared by Anton Gerashchenko, an advisor at Ukraine’s interior ministry. He told Bloomberg it was Ukrainian rebels who shot down the plane.
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Writing on his Facebook page, Gerashenko said the Boeing 777 was hit by a missile at altitude, fired from an anti-missile system named “Buk” by militants.
Sources say 280 passengers and 15 crew members were onboard the flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.
The flight is understood to have been around four-and-a-half hours into its 11-and-a-half hour journey before it went missing.
The Boeing passenger liner came down close to town of Shaktarsk in the rebellion-wracked region of Donetsk after disappearing from the radar and teams from the emergency services were trying to reach the scene, an unnamed security source told Interfax-Ukraine news agency.
The crash of the airplane is confirmed with reporters on the ground such as Reuters correspondent in Eastern Ukraine , who reports seeing burning wreckage of airplane and bodies on ground
The site of a Malaysia Airlines plane crash in the settlement of Grabovo in Donetsk region: http://t.co/yVWeqntSaK pic.twitter.com/guBJ5ppeRy
— Reuters Top News (@Reuters) July 17, 2014
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak on his Twitter said: “I am shocked by reports that an MH plane crashed. We are launching an immediate investigation.”