Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images
The victims include a child studying in third-grade.
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A Bangladesh Air Force training jet crashed onto the grounds of Milestone School and College in Dhaka on Monday, killing at least 19 people, including the pilot, and injuring 164 others. The F-7 BGI jet, which had suffered a mechanical issue soon after takeoff, slammed into a two-story school building, causing a fire, thick smoke, and widespread fear.
Warning: The article includes videos, images, and descriptions of plane crashing into a school.
The F-7 BGI jet had taken off at 1:06 PM from the Bangladesh Air Force base in Kurmitola, Dhaka, for a standard training flight. Not long after, it developed a technical problem. According to Fox, Military spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Sami Ud Dowla Chowdhury stated that “The pilot … made a valiant attempt to divert the aircraft away from densely populated areas. Despite his best efforts, the aircraft … crashed into a two-story building belonging to Milestone School and College.”
Photos and videos from the scene showed a massive fire and a thick column of smoke rising into the air. Firefighters and soldiers worked without stopping to put out the flames and pull survivors from the wreckage of the plane and the damaged school. The crash left a huge hole in the building, and witnesses described a terrible scene of shouting and crying as people looked for family and friends.
Bidhan Sarker, head of the burn unit at Dhaka Medical College and Hospital, where some victims were taken, confirmed that a third-grade student was among those who died, while others, aged 12, 14, and 40, were admitted with injuries. Many of the hurt were students, with some suffering serious burns.
The F-7 BGI is the most modern version of China’s Chengdu J-7/F-7 aircraft, a licensed copy of the Soviet MiG-21. Bangladesh bought 16 of these planes between 2011 and 2013.
A teacher at the school, Masud Tarik, described the moment of the crash: “When I was picking up my kids and went to the gate, I felt something come from behind… I heard an explosion. When I turned back, I only saw fire and smoke.”
We’ve had deadly plane crashes before, especially in 2025, which has seen a shockingly high number of plane crashes this year. But nothing can dampen the hard breaking reality of innocent lives lost.
A team has been set up to look into the cause of the tragedy. This crash happened just over a month after a deadly Air India plane crash in Ahmedabad, India, which killed 241 passengers and crew along with 19 people on the ground, making it the world’s worst aviation disaster in ten years.
Published: Jul 21, 2025 03:19 pm