MOSCOW (AP) - A long-range Russian bomber with an empty payload crashed in the country's northwest, killing all four crew members, the Defense Ministry said Friday.
The TU-22 M3 bomber was approaching the Saltsy air field in the Novgorod region, south of St. Petersburg, late Thursday when flight controllers lost contact with it, the ministry's press service said.
The crew was ordered to bail out of the aircraft but did not, the Interfax news agency reported, citing a Defense Ministry source it did not name.
Emergency workers found the wreckage about six miles from the airfield and recovered the bodies just after midnight. Officials hoped to find the flight data recorders Friday.
The bomber wasn't carrying any weapons. Air force officials ordered all such bombers grounded pending an investigation into the crash.
In September, a TU-160 strategic bomber crashed while performing a test flight southeast of Moscow, killing all four crew members. Defense officials blamed technical malfunctions.
Increasing wear-and-tear on Russian air force planes and lack of pilot training have contributed to an increasing number of crashes of combat aircraft in recent years. Because of fuel shortages, Russian pilots fly an average of only some 20 hours a year compared to a minimum of 200 hours in Western air forces.
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Russia is in a really sorry state. I was shocked at the figure. Thats ten times less. I'm surprised there isn't a lot more crashes. 
That in itself is depressing.
