(CNN) — A Thai airliner carrying 130 people crashed Sunday at the Phuket airport in southern Thailand shortly after landing, witnesses and officials said. Reports say at least 66 people were killed.
A spokesman for One-Two-Go Airlines said Flight 269 left Bangkok at 2:30 p.m. local time and was scheduled to land in Phuket at 3:50 p.m. The plane was carrying 123 passengers and seven crew members, he said.
He had no information about casualties.
Phuket’s Deputy Governor Worapot Ratthaseema told The Associated Press that at least 66 bodies were laid out in the airport building.
“At least 66 people have been confirmed and 42 have been hospitalized,” Worapot said, adding the remaining passengers are missing and presumed to be still inside the wreckage.
Thailand’s national news agency reported 20 survivors were taken to hospitals to be treated for their injuries, according to the director-general of Thailand’s Civil Aviation Department.
The main hospital in Phuket was treating 28 patients injured the crash, a hospital spokeswoman told CNN.
The hospital detailed their nationalities as: Australian: 1, Austrian: 1, British: 8, German: 4, Iranian: 3, Irish: 3, Italy: 1, Thai: 7 .
The passenger jet skidded off the runway during a landing attempt amid heavy rain and strong crosswinds, according to Thai News Agency (TNA).
“The inside (of the plane) was totally on fire and about five minutes of burning, there was a small explosion that blew off top of the plane.”
Harding said he landed at Phuket on another One-Two-Go airliner that landed five minutes before the plane crash.
“It was the roughest landing I’ve ever experienced,” he said. “I’ve never been through anything like that.”
Harding, who lives in the resort town of Phuket, said the plane “knocked up against a hill.”
Video showed dozens of ambulances and fire trucks on the scene, which was enveloped in black smoke.
“The jet was crashed and up into a hill that’s the size of a runway,” Harding said. “It looked basically intact. The wing was still attached to the fuselage. The tail was down. But the inside of the plane was totally ablaze.”
One-Two-Go, a subsidiary of Orient Thai Airways is a low-cost airliner that operates in Thailand.
October 30th, 2007 at 1:27 am
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