Russia’s fall exercises took a toll on some conscripts participating in them. Three were killed in Union Shield-2011 at Ashuluk, and two more may have died during Tsentr-2011.
Life.ru reports a conscript died on September 26 from injuries sustained in a fall from a railroad platform while loading equipment during Union Shield-2011.
According to IA Regnum, at Ashuluk on September 24, an automated command and control system operator, a draftee, was found dead in a KamAZ. An officer and two conscripts had to wait for help overnight when their vehicle broke down. One of the conscripts apparently died during the night.
On September 20, a Russian attack aircraft fired an errant air-to-surface rocket that flew several kilometers from its intended target before exploding, killing one soldier and injuring a second. IA Rosbalt also noted Ashuluk was the scene of an August 23 ordnance accident that killed eight soldiers.
News outlets and military spokesmen are publicly disputing whether two tank crewmen died of carbon monoxide poisoning while President Medvedev and Defense Minister Serdyukov reviewed the concluding phase of Tsentr-2011 at Chebarkul on September 27.
According to Novyy region, a Chelyabinsk rights activist says two conscripts died and the military is trying to cover up the accident. Another source says the two men are hospitalized in critical and serious condition respectively. The army says the men were poisoned by powder gases during training before Tsentr, and will soon be discharged from the hospital. The Central MD’s press-service says the exercise was conducted without incidents, accidents, or equipment failures.
Military prosecutors are investigating at least some of these incidents.
Russian Defense Policy 