Plane Carrying KHL Team Crashes; 36 Reported Dead

Earlier this morning, a plane carrying the Kontinental Hockey League club Yaroslav Lokomotiv crashed during takeoff.

Various reports place the number of dead at 36, although at this early stage it is impossible to confirm precisely who was on-board the plane when it crashed.  Reports also cite just a single survivor, unnamed but in critical condition.

Lokomotiv employed a number of people that NHL fans will be familiar with.  The head coach was Brad McCrimmon, a veteran of over 1200 NHL games and a long-time assistant coach at the NHL level, with the Islanders, Flames, Thrashers and Red Wings.

The captain of the club was former NHL’er Karel Rachunek.  Other ex-NHL’ers playing for Lokomotiv include Pavol Demitra, Ruslan Salei, Karlis Skrastins and Josef Vasicek.  It remains uncertain if those players were on-board at the time of the crash.

Update: Dmitri Chesnokov reports that “Lokomotiv official said the entire team was on the plane because they were traveling for the 1st game of the season, a celebration.”

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