Taiwan’s top military official was killed in an air force helicopter crash in mountainous terrain outside Taipei on Thursday, the defense ministry said. Eight people died, including other senior military officials and the two pilots, and five survived. The UH-60M Black Hawk dropped off the radar screen 10 minutes after takeoff from Songshan air force base, the Associated Press reports. It went down in the mountainous, heavily forested Wulai area southeast of the capital. As chief of the general staff, Gen. Shen Yi-ming was responsible for overseeing the self-governing island’s defense against China, which has threatened to use military force to annex what it considers part of its territory. The crash is not being attributed to sabotage by most observers.