The Kremlin lauded two Russian pilots as heroes and said they would be handed state awards after they landed an airliner carrying 233 people in a cornfield outside Moscow after striking a flock of birds during take-off.

Russians have said it was a miracle that no one was killed when the Ural Airlines Airbus 321 came down in a field southeast of Moscow with its landing gear up after hitting a passing flock of gulls, disrupting the plane’s engines. Up to 55 people, including 17 children, were treated for injuries, six of whom have been hospitalised, Russian news agencies quoted the emergencies ministry as saying.

State television said the incident was being dubbed the “miracle over Ramensk”, the name of the district near Moscow where the plane came down around 1km from Zhukovsky International Airport. The Komsomolskaya Pravda tabloid praised pilot Damir Yusupov as a “hero”, saying he had saved 233 lives, “having masterfully landed a plane without its landing gear with a failing engine”. Reuters