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The mystery is deepening over the apparent presence of a second private jet in the sky in the same area where the plane listing Yevgeny Prigozhin, the chief of the Russian Wagner mercenary group that was recently involved in a mutiny against President Vladimir Putin, crashed Wednesday killing all 10 aboard.
Prigozhin was reported aboard the plane that crashed north of Moscow with no survivors, the Russian authorities said, two months to the day after he led an abortive mutiny against the army top brass, according to a Reuters report.
The Kremlin or the Defence Ministry has not commented on the fate of Prigozhin, head of the Wagner group and enemy to the army's leadership over the incompetent prosecution of Russia's war in Ukraine.
A Telegram channel linked to Wagner, Grey Zone, pronounced him dead, however, and hailed him as a hero and a patriot who it said had died at the hands of unidentified people it called "traitors to Russia," according to Reuters
A reporter of the news agency at the crash site saw men removing black body bags. Part of the plane's tail and other fragments lay on the ground near a wooded area where forensic investigators had erected a tent. Mourners left flowers and lit candles near Wagner's offices in St Petersburg early on Thursday.
Some Prigozhin supporters have blamed the Russian state, and others Ukraine, where the Wagner group was involved in intense battles on many fronts.
Reuters reports that whoever or whatever was behind the crash, his death would rid Putin of someone who had mounted the most serious challenge to the Russian leader's authority since assuming power in 1999.
Reports show several rivals of Putin or opponents of his interests have also died under unclear circumstances or come close to death, including outspoken political leaders and journalists. The Kremlin has always denied any state involvement in such incidents.
Prigozhin's removal from the scene would leave the Wagner Group, which tried to stage an armed mutiny against the army's top brass, without a leader.
The Brazilian Embraer (EMBR3.SA) Legacy 600 executive jet is considered an exceptionally safe airliner as it has recorded only one accident in over 20 years of service, says the International Aviation HQ website.
Rosaviatsia, Russia's aviation agency, published the names of all 10 people on board the crashed plane, including Prigozhin and Dmitry Utkin, his right-hand man who helped found the group.
Russian investigators said they had opened a criminal investigation. Reports in the Russian media quoting unnamed sources said the plane had been shot down by one or more surface-to-air missiles.
The aircraft crashed near the village of Kuzhenkino in the Tver Region , en route to St. Petersburg, from Moscow, Russia's emergency situations ministry said.
Meanwhile, Flightradar24 online tracker showed that the Embraer plane (registration number RA-02795) with Prigozhin listed as a passenger vanished from the radar at 6:11 p.m. (1511 GMT). An unverified video clip posted to social media showed a plane resembling a private jet falling out of the sky.
Another unverified clip showed the burning wreckage of the plane on the ground, reports said. Rescuers had recovered all 10 bodies or what was left of them from the scene, Russian news agencies reported.
Soon after the plane crashed, a second private jet thought linked to Prigozhin, which also appeared to be heading to St. Petersburg, Prigozhin's home base, turned back to Moscow, flight tracking data showed, and later landed.
Prigozhin, 62, spearheaded the mutiny against Russia's top army brass on June 23-24 which Putin said could have tipped Russia into civil war. Wagner fighters shot down Russian attack helicopters during the revolt, killing an unconfirmed number of pilots, infuriating the military.
The mutiny ended following an apparent Kremlin deal which saw Prigozhin agree to relocate to Belarus. But in practice he was poppin gin and out of Russia freely.