According to local media reports cited by Reuters, the accident occurred on Friday evening in El Alto, Bolivia’s second largest city. The machine fell onto a busy avenue.
According to local Unitel television, which cites the Bolivian Ministry of Defense, the Hercules plane that crashed in Bolivia’s second largest city was carrying new banknotes. The cause of the disaster was said to be bad weather conditions.
Citing recordings published on social networks, Reuters reported that people began to gather at the scene of the accident to collect the scattered money, and security services tried to disperse the crowd using water cannons. The agency emphasized that it was unable to verify the authenticity of the recordings.
The national air carrier Boliviana de Aviacion announced that El Alto International Airport was temporarily closed
The president of the Central Bank of Bolivia admitted that the plane that crashed in El Alto was actually carrying money. The military Hercules took off from Santa Cruz and was scheduled to land at El Alto airport. Unfortunately, it crashed.
On board – as the bank’s president explains – banknotes produced on behalf of the bank by Crane Currency based in Malta were transported. However, these banknotes were not “monetized”, so they have no “legal value”, said the bank’s president and asked for their return. He added that possessing and using them is a crime.
