Plane with 67 onboard crashes in fireball explosion in Kazakhstan
Horror moment plane with 67 onboard crashes in fireball explosion in Kazakhstan with dozens feared dead in Christmas Day disaster. Watch video.
World
Don't miss out on the headlines from World. Followed categories will be added to My News.
A passenger plane plunged from the sky, erupting into a fireball in a devastating Christmas Day crash that has left 38 dead.
Heart-stopping footage shows the Embraer aircraft nosediving before smashing into the ground near Aktau in western Kazakhstan.
The plane’s course on Flight Radar website showed it flying away from its normal route and then circling over the area where it eventually crashed near Aktau, which is an oil and gas hub on the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea.
“The situation is not very good, 38 dead,” Russia’s Interfax news agency quoted Kazakh Deputy Prime Minister Kanat Bozumbayev as saying.
The Kazakh emergency situations ministry reported that “29 survivors including three children have been hospitalised.”
The plane, operated by Azerbaijan Airlines, had 62 passengers and five crew members on board.
The Kazakh transport ministry said the plane was carrying 37 nationals from Azerbaijan, six from Kazakhstan, three from Kyrgyzstan and 16 from Russia.
Kazakhstan said it had opened an investigation into the cause of the crash, which was not immediately clear.Azerbaijan Airlines initially said the plane flew threw a flock of birds before withdrawing the statement.
Its fiery descent saw it breaking into several parts upon crash landing.
Approximately 150 emergency responders rushed to the scene, battling towering flames and thick plumes of black smoke rising ominously into the sky.
Kazakhstan authorities said that 28 people were miraculously pulled from the wreckage, some in critical condition, but 38 have now been confirmed dead.
The Central Asian country’s emergencies ministry said in a statement that fire services had put out the blaze and that the survivors were being treated at a nearby hospital.
Two of the hospitalised survivors are children, believed to be girls aged 11 and 16.
“They are receiving all the necessary medical care in hospitals in the region,” said the Ministry of Health.
Russian news agency Interfax reported that the ministry indicated the possibility of additional survivors.
“We cannot disclose any investigation results at this time,” the office of Azerbaijan’s prosecutor general said in a statement.
“All possible scenarios are being examined, and the necessary expert analyses are underway,” it added.
It said an investigative team led by the deputy prosecutor general of Azerbaijan has been dispatched to Kazakhstan and is working at the crash site.
Kazakhstan’s prosecutor in charge of transportation cases, Timur Suleymanov, said the plane’s flight data recorder had been found, Interfax news agency reported.
Flight-tracking data from FlightRadar24.com revealed that the aircraft made what appeared to be a figure-eight manoeuvre as it approached Aktau airport.
Its altitude fluctuated significantly during the final moments of the flight before crashing.
In a separate online post, FlightRadar24 reported that the plane experienced severe GPS jamming, which caused it to transmit faulty ADS-B data — the information used by flight-tracking websites to monitor planes in real time.
Russia has previously been accused of jamming GPS signals in the region, raising questions about its potential involvement, according to The Sun.
Officials revealed the flight, en route from Azerbaijan’s capital Baku to Grozny in Russia, sent out a distress signal at just 2,125 feet over the Caspian Sea.
The cockpit’s final, desperate attempt to land in Aktau was captured in horrifying detail.
The aircraft is seen descending too steeply, its nose pointed sharply down, moments before the crash shattered the festive morning.
Witnesses described a deafening explosion as the plane broke apart and burst into flames upon impact.
Images of the flaming wreckage, with emergency services battling to control the inferno, capture the sheer scale of the disaster as charred fragments of the plane lie scattered across the crash site.
Kazaeronavigatsiya, Kazakhstan’s air navigation authority, confirmed the emergency declaration, stating: “The Embraer 190 AHY8243 aircraft travelling on the Baku-Grozny route declared an emergency situation due to a collision with a bird and violation of steering control.”
Russian news agencies said the plane had been rerouted due to fog in Grozny.
Authorities in Kazakhstan said they had begun looking into different possible versions of what had happened, including a technical problem, Russia’s Interfax news agency reported.
Russia’s aviation watchdog said in a statement that preliminary information suggested the pilot had decided to make an emergency landing after a bird strike.
Following the crash, Ilham Aliyev, the president of Azerbaijan, was returning home from Russia where he had been due to attend a summit on Wednesday, Russia’s RIA news agency reported.
Ramzan Kadyrov, the Kremlin-backed leader of Chechnya, expressed his condolences in a statement and said those being treated in hospital were in an extremely serious condition and that he and others would pray for their rapid recovery.
Aktau residents have been asked to donate blood for the survivors.
Kazakhstan has appointed a commission to investigate the plane crash.
More Coverage
Originally published as Plane with 67 onboard crashes in fireball explosion in Kazakhstan