25 die in Congo plane crash
Friday, October 5, 2007
A SOVIET-ERA cargo plane crashed in a residential area of Kinshasa yesterday, killing 25 people on board as it smashed through a dozen houses and exploded in a fireball.
Fatalities were also reported on the ground, but no precise death toll. Medical officials said 21 people had been hospitalised.
The Antonov 26 aircraft crashed in the densely populated Masina district of the Democratic Republic of Congo capital just after take-off from the nearby airport, a government minister said.
"There were 27 people on the plane and 25 died and two members of the crew, a mechanic and an air hostess survived," said Michel Bonnardeaux, a spokesman for the UN mission in the DRC, MONUC, quoting local officials.
Witnesses said the twin-engined plane exploded in flames on impact. The RVA national aviation authority sent firefighters to help poorly equipped city firemen tackle the blaze.
"There were several dead people in the houses," Information Minister Toussaint Tshilombo Send told AFP.
"It's really premature at this stage to give any exact toll," the minister stressed. The disaster was the fourth deadly plane accident in DR Congo since June.
In 1996, a larger Antonov 32 hit a Kinshasa market and the final death toll was more than 300.
Humanitarian Affairs Minister Jean-Claude Muyambo told AFP that the cargo plane belonged to the Africa One airline and had been headed to Tshikapa in the vast country's central Kasai-Occidental province.
"The aircraft is completely burned out," a senior police officer said at the scene. "The number of people also killed in the houses it struck isn't yet known."
AFP
Fatalities were also reported on the ground, but no precise death toll. Medical officials said 21 people had been hospitalised.
The Antonov 26 aircraft crashed in the densely populated Masina district of the Democratic Republic of Congo capital just after take-off from the nearby airport, a government minister said.
"There were 27 people on the plane and 25 died and two members of the crew, a mechanic and an air hostess survived," said Michel Bonnardeaux, a spokesman for the UN mission in the DRC, MONUC, quoting local officials.
Witnesses said the twin-engined plane exploded in flames on impact. The RVA national aviation authority sent firefighters to help poorly equipped city firemen tackle the blaze.
"There were several dead people in the houses," Information Minister Toussaint Tshilombo Send told AFP.
"It's really premature at this stage to give any exact toll," the minister stressed. The disaster was the fourth deadly plane accident in DR Congo since June.
In 1996, a larger Antonov 32 hit a Kinshasa market and the final death toll was more than 300.
Humanitarian Affairs Minister Jean-Claude Muyambo told AFP that the cargo plane belonged to the Africa One airline and had been headed to Tshikapa in the vast country's central Kasai-Occidental province.
"The aircraft is completely burned out," a senior police officer said at the scene. "The number of people also killed in the houses it struck isn't yet known."
AFP
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