MOSCOW - A military cargo plane carrying Russian naval officers crashed in northern Russia, killing 17 people and injuring three, the Emergency Situations Ministry said Friday.

The An-26 crashed late Thursday while trying to make an emergency landing at the airport in Lakhta, near the White Sea port of Arkhangelsk, some 960 kilometers (600 miles) north of Moscow.

The plane was carrying eight crew members and 12 passengers, including an 11-year-old girl, according to the ITAR-Tass news agency. The majority of passengers were naval officers returning from a meeting of the Northern Fleet in the Murmansk region.

The plane landed 1.5 kilometers (1 mile) short of the runway, shearing treetops, ITAR-Tass said.

Officials did not say why the plane had attempted the emergency landing.

But one of the plane's pilots, Yuri Koledov, told ITAR-Tass from his hospital bed that bad weather may have contributed to the crash. He said that the plane was in good condition and that the crew had often flown in it.

"It happened unexpectedly. We were already landing. There was a strong wind, and it was snowing," Koledov was quoted as saying.

A team of Defense Ministry investigators was examining the crash site, and the plane's black boxes have been found, the news agency said.