Search teams are combing the wreckage of an Algerian military plane for clues to why it crashed in a mountainous region, killing all but one of 78 people on board.
Algerians began three days of national mourning after the C-130 Hercules aircraft carrying 74 passengers - soldiers and their families - and four crew came down in bad weather on Tuesday in the northeast Oum El Bouaghi region.
One survivor was found, official sources said of Algeria's worst aviation disaster in more than 10 years.
A special unit arrived at the crash site early on Wednesday, as search teams scoured the snowy and rugged area.
Rescue reinforcements and sniffer dog teams have started their search, headed by emergency service chief Mustapha Lahbiri.
The survivor, suffering from serious head injuries, was taken to the military hospital in the city of Constantine, where the plane had been headed, as were the bodies of the dead.
"School notebooks and military duffel bags were also visible at the site of the crash," the source said.
Colonel Lahbiri said the black box flight recorder had not been found, contradicting earlier reports that rescue teams had located one of two black boxes.
The military transport plane was flying from the desert garrison town of Tamanrasset in Algeria's deep south to Constantine, 320 kilometres east of Algiers, and lost contact with the control tower as it was beginning its descent.
Algerian television broadcast images of the crash scene showing the broken aircraft lying in a mountainous landscape, at an altitude of 1500 metres.
Flight specialist Kaddouche Maamar, quoted by Algerian daily El Watan, said the airport in Constantine is particularly difficult because of the high surrounding terrain.
"Very bad weather conditions, involving a storm and heavy snowfall, were behind the crash," the defence ministry said in a statement on Tuesday.
President Abdelaziz Bouteflika announced three days of national mourning, praising the soldiers who perished in the crash as "martyrs".
