American, 8 Others Die in Copter Crash

A helicopter carrying U.N. disaster relief officials crashed in northwestern Mongolia, killing nine people, including an American and four other foreigners, officials said. Fourteen people were injured, 10 of them critically. The Russian-made MI-8 spun out of control about 165 feet off the ground, crashed and exploded in flames, a Mongolian civil defense official said. U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard in New York said four members of the relief team were killed: an American, a Briton, a German and a Mongolian. He said the crash also killed three other Mongolians--a member of parliament, a photographer and a helicopter technician--and two Japanese journalists.