A Russian An-26 military transport plane crashed into a cliff in Crimea, killing 29 people on board, due to a ​possible technical malfunction, Russia's defence ministry said early on Wednesday, according to ‌news agencies.

TASS news agency, quoting the ministry, said communication with the aircraft was lost at about 6 p.m. local time (1500 GMT) on Tuesday on a planned flight over Crimea. The peninsula, covered in ​sweeping mountains leading down to the coast of the Black Sea, was annexed ​by Russia from Ukraine in 2014.

“The defence ministry reported that a ⁠search team found the site of the catastrophe,” TASS reported. “According to a report from ​the site, six crew members and 23 passengers on board were killed.”

The ministry report ​did not say how many people were on board, but it made no mention of any survivors on the An-26, a light tactical military transport that has for decades been a mainstay that ​can carry cargo and up to 40 passengers over short and medium distances.

“There was ​no impact on the aircraft,” TASS quoted the ministry as saying, implying that objects like missiles, drones ‌and ⁠birds were not involved.

“The preliminary cause of the crash is a technical malfunction. A commission from the military is working at the site,” it said.

Russia's defence ministry did not respond immediately to a request for comment outside normal business hours.

The An-26 has been ​in service since the ​late 1960s and ⁠has also been used by airlines to carry freight, but the model has been involved in a number of deadly crashes over ​the last decade.

A Ukrainian An-26 crashed during a technical flight ​in Ukraine's ⁠southeastern Zaporizhzhia region in 2022, killing one person. Another aircraft crashed on a training flight in northeastern Ukraine in 2020, killing all but one of the 27 people on board.

Eight ⁠people, including ​five Russians, were killed when an An-26 crashed ​in South Sudan in 2020. Four of 10 people on board were killed when an An-26 crashed on ​landing in Ivory Coast in West Africa in 2017.