A TransAsia Airways plane crashed when making an emergency landing in Taiwan today, killing 47 people.
The accident happened in the Penghu islands, also known as Pescadores.
“It’s chaotic on the scene,” Jean Shen, director of the civil aviation authorities, told Reuters. “The fire department was putting out the flames.”
TransAsia Airways is a Taiwan-based airline with a fleet of 23 mostly Airbus aircraft, flying chiefly on domestic routes, but with some flights to Japan, Thailand and Cambodia, among its Asian destinations.
No more details were immediately available, but we will be updating this post very soon.
This is very unfortunate, especially when this has occurred right after the recent flight MH17 incident.
UPDATE:
The turboprop plane crashed on its second attempt at landing during a thunderstorm. Besides killing 47 people, the crash also set buildings on fire.
There were 54 passengers and four crew members on board the 70-seat ATR 72 plane. No one was killed or hurt in the buildings.
Besides the deceased, 11 people on the plane were injured and were taken to a hospital.
The plane took off from Taiwan’s southern city of Kaohsiung, headed towards the island of Makong, but crash-landed in Penghu County.
“It was thunderstorm conditions during the crash,” said Hsi Wen-guang, a spokesman from the Penghu County Government Fire Bureau.
“From the crash site we sent 11 people to hospital with injuries. A few empty apartment buildings adjacent to the runway caught fire, but no one was inside at the time and the fire was extinguished.”
About 100 firefighters were sent to the scene, besides 152 military personnel and 255 police.
Typhoon Matmo hit Taiwan on Wednesday, bringing heavy rain and strong winds, shutting financial markets and schools. It passed the island and headed into China, then, it downgraded from typhoon to tropical storm.
More to come.
