A 70-seat ATR 72 TransAsia
Airways turboprop plane crashed on
Wednesday, which killed at least 47
people and put few empty buildings on
fire. According the officials, the plane crashed on its second attempt at
emergency landing due to typhoon
condition on an Island off Taiwan.
Nobody was killed nor
hurt in the buildings while 47 people died and 11 were injured. The injured people
were taken to the nearest hospital. There are 58 passengers were on board.
The plane took off
from Kaohsiung International Airport in Taiwan at about 5 p.m. local time and
was heading for Penghu’s Makong Airport, but it crash-landed in Huxi
township of Penghu County, the main island of the chain which also known as the
Pescadores. Before the plane landing at about 7 p.m., the plane captain managed
to report a lost contact with the plane tower.
The spokesman for the
Penghu County Government Fire Bureau Hsi Wen-guang said that it was a typhoon
condition when the plane crashed. A few vacant buildings near the runway,
caught the fire but fortunately, no one occupied the buildings. Hundred of rescuers were sent off to the fire
scene, including 100 firefighters, 152 military personnel and 255 police.
On Wednesday, Taiwan
was slammed by Typhoon Matmo packing heavy rain and strong winds.
The typhoon passed the island and headed
into China, where it reduced from a typhoon to a tropical storm.
TransAsia Airways is
a Taiwan-based airline with a naval force of around 23 Airbus and ATR aircraft,
operating chiefly short-haul flights for domestic and continental routes to China,
Japan, Thailand and Cambodia.
Source: straitstimes
Photo: credit to the owner
