MOSCOW, May 7. /TASS/: The Aeroflot airline company has started making compensation payments to passengers of the plane that crashed at Moscow Sheremetyevo airport on May 5, a source in the company told TASS.
"We have transferred compensations in the amount of 2 mln rubles [about $30,650] to four of the injured currently in hospitals, 1 mln rubles [about $15,325] to the passenger who refused hospitalization," the source said.
Overall, the company has paid 9 mln rubles ($137,942) in compensation so far.
Earlier, Russian Transport Minister Yevgeny Dietrich said that the Aeroflot board of directors would consider the issue of compensation payments on Tuesday. The company had previously agreed to pay 1 mln rubles in compensation to the passengers who had not been hospitalized, 2 mln rubles to the passengers remaining in hospitals, and 5 mln rubles (about $76,634) to the families of those killed in the crash.
Aeroflot’s Sukhoi Superjet-100 passenger plane (flight SU-1492) with 73 passengers and five crewmembers onboard that was bound for Murmansk caught fire after emergency landing at Sheremetyevo shortly after its takeoff on May 5. A total of 41 people, including two children, were killed in the plane fire.
