Ten survivors of a helicopter crash in the Russian Arctic have been transferred to the mainland and the four most seriously injured flown to a Moscow hospital for emergency treatment.


Eight people were killed in the Thursday crash, but only seven bodies had been recovered by Sunday, said Alexander Suvorov of the Federal Border Service, which owned the helicopter


Suvorov said the remains of the eighth victim were believed to be buried underneath a truck that was being carried aboard the helicopter.


The Mi-26 heavy-lift helicopter was carrying 12 border guards and a crew of six when it went missing Thursday. It disappeared on a flight from Cape Chelyuskin, continental Russia's northernmost point, to Severnaya Zemlya, a group of islands in the Arctic. After two days of an intensive search for the vanished chopper, a rescue helicopter spotted tents and survivors on Bolshevik Island off Russia's far northern coast.


The 10 survivors were flown to the nuclear-powered icebreaker Sovietsky Soyuz, which took them to the mainland. They were flown to the Siberian city of Vorkuta and four of the most seriously injured were later taken to Moscow aboard a special air ambulance.