Mourning ceremony held for Ukrainian air show victims

Hundreds of mourners gathered today for a memorial ceremony on the charred Ukrainian airstrip where a military jet ploughed into hundreds of spectators at an air show, killing at least 83.

As relatives of the dead sought someone to blame, Ukraine’s air force commander and a top officer had been detained, the Su-27’s two pilots were under investigation and the country’s defence minister had submitted his resignation.

Two main causes were being considered - pilot carelessness or mechanical failure of the 15-year-old plane.

The former Soviet republic of 50 million people was united in its sorrow after Saturday’s crash, the world’s deadliest air show accident.

Officials at the mayor’s office in the western city of Lviv said 83 people were killed, including 23 children, and 199 people were injured.

Forensic experts were still identifying remains today. The first funerals were scheduled for tomorrow.

Relatives of the dead and spectators who survived the disaster streamed into the Sknyliv air base for a brief memorial ceremony led by Ukrainian Orthodox clerics. One woman held a candle.

Flowers were strewn around the singed turf where the fighter jet exploded in a huge ball of fire. The site itself was cordoned off by security officials.

The jet had been performing a risky manoeuvre at low altitude when it clipped the ground, sliced off the nose of a plane as it roared through a crowd of hundreds of spectators. The pilots ejected and survived.

‘‘The plane started killing people as it was coming in,’’ said Ivan Kravchenko, who saw the crash from about 50 yards away. ‘‘I thought, ‘It’s flying too low over people. This is not a good stunt.’’’

He said his grandson, four-year-old Vitaly, asked him later: ‘‘Grandpa, is that what’s supposed to happen?’’

Raisa Volodymyrova was standing next to the Il-76MD that was clipped by the Su-27.

‘‘There were piles and piles of people around me. There was a body of a child lying on me,’’ she recalled tearfully at the ceremony.

The accident was the latest blow for Ukraine’s cash-strapped military.

Defence Minister Vladimir Shkidchenko tendered his resignation yesterday, which was being considered by President Leonid Kuchma.

Shkidchenko’s predecessor was fired after a Ukrainian missile accidentally downed a Russian passenger jet over the Black Sea.

Air Force Commander General Colonel Vladimir Strelnikov and Lieutenant Colonel S Opyshchak were fired by Kuchma and detained on suspicion of ‘‘negligent attitude to military service that led to grave consequences,’’ the Prosecutor General’s Office said. Kuchma also fired the chief of the general staff.

A court will decide whether to arrest the two pilots after they recover from their injuries, prosecutors said.

Russian officials and media said pilot error was probably to blame, and criticised Ukraine for failing to maintain its Soviet-era aircraft and properly train pilots - criticisms that also have been levelled at Russia’s post-Soviet military.

‘‘In Ukraine, as in Russia, flights are conducted irregularly, the equipment gets stale and often the human factor can bring about a tragedy,’’ Russian test pilot Anatoly Kvochur was quoted by the Kommersant newspaper as saying.