Chinese Boeing crashes with 132 on board, no sign of survivors

Beijing, March 21 (BNA) A China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737-800 with 132 people on board crashed in the mountains of southern China on a domestic flight on Monday, and media reported that rescue workers found no sign of survivors.

The plane was on its way from the southwestern Chinese city of Kunming, the capital of Yunnan Province, to Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong, which borders Hong Kong, Reuters reported.

There was no immediate information on the cause of the accident.

“The downing of the plane can be confirmed,” China’s Eastern Airlines said in a statement.

Media quoted a rescue official as saying that the plane crashed and caused a fire that destroyed bamboo trees.

The People’s Daily quoted an official with the provincial fire department as saying that there was no sign of life among the scattered debris.

The Chinese Civil Aviation Administration and the airline said the plane, which had 123 passengers and nine crew on board, had lost contact with Wuzhou.

FlightRadar24 data showed that the flight left Kunming at 1:11 pm (5:11 GMT), and was scheduled to land in Guangzhou at 3:05 pm (7:05 GMT).

The plane, which Flightradar24 said was six years old, was flying at 29,100 feet at 6:20 GMT. After just over two minutes and 15 seconds, the data showed that he had plummeted to 9,075 feet.

In another 20 seconds, Flightradar24 said, the last tracked altitude was 3,225 feet, indicating a vertical drop of 31,000 feet per minute.

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Online weather data showed partly cloudy conditions with good visibility in Wuzhou at the time of the accident.

President Xi Jinping has called on investigators to determine the cause of the crash as soon as possible and ensure “absolute” flight safety, state broadcaster CCTV reported.

Boeing shares fell 6.4 percent to $180.44 in pre-market trading. Boeing did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Shares of China Eastern Airlines in Hong Kong closed 6.5% lower after news of the collapse spread, while its US-listed shares fell 17% in pre-market trading.

Flight data provider OAG said this month that state-owned China Eastern Airlines was the sixth largest in the world by scheduled weekly seat capacity and the largest in China.

China had a relatively strong domestic aviation market during the coronavirus pandemic despite strict restrictions on international flights.

The safety record of China’s aviation industry has been among the best in the world over the past decade.

“China Eastern and China in general have had a good track record in aviation safety over the past decade or so,” said Shakur Yusuf, president of Malaysia-based aviation consultancy Endo Andau Analytics.

“CAAC has very strict safety regulations and we will just need to wait for more details to help shed light on the plausible cause of the accident.”

The 737-800 that crashed on Monday has a good safety record and is the predecessor of the 737 Max which has been decommissioned in China for more than three years after fatal accidents in 2018 in Indonesia and 2019 in Ethiopia.

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Investigators will look to recover the plane’s two so-called black boxes – the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder – to help shed light on the accident.

According to the Aviation Safety Network, the last fatal plane crash in China was in 2010, when 44 of the 96 people on board were killed when a regional Embraer E-190 plane carrying Henan Airlines crashed as it approached Yichun Airport in poor visibility. .

In 1994, a China Northwest Airlines Tu-154 flying from Xi’an to Guangzhou crashed, killing all 160 people on board and categorizing it as China’s worst air disaster, according to the Aviation Safety Network.








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