At least one airline had questioned the safety of nighttime landings at the relatively new airport in northeast China where a passenger jet crashed and burned while trying to land at night on a fog-shrouded runway, killing 42 people and injuring 54.
The Henan Airlines plane crashed late on Tuesday in a grassy area near the Lindu airport in the Heilongjiang Province city of Yichun.
Survivors among the 96 passengers and crew described scenes of horror, with luggage falling down and escapes through flames and broken holes in the fuselage.
PHOTO: AFP
It was China’s first major commercial air disaster in almost six years. The plane’s two black boxes were recovered yesterday, Xinhua news agency reported, but it is still not known what caused the accident.
Chinese Vice Premier Zhang Dejiang (張德江) arrived yesterday at the crash site to help set up an investigation team. State television reported that a preliminary investigation found that the airplane did not catch fire or explode in the air and that there were no signs of sabotage.
The newly built airport in Yichun sits in a forested valley and has operated for a year.
PHOTO: EPA
China Southern Airlines decided in August last year to avoid night flights in and out of Yichun, switching its daily flight from Harbin to the daytime. A technical notice cited concerns about the airport’s surrounding terrain, runway lighting and wind and weather conditions.
“Principally, there should be no night flights at Yichun airport,” said the notice from China Southern’s Heilongjiang branch that was posted online.
An employee with the branch’s technical office confirmed the notice’s authenticity. He declined to give his name because he was not authorized to talk to the media, but said China Southern decided to cancel night flights at Yichun “for safety concerns. We’re cautious.”
The crash and fire were so severe that little of the fuselage remained, though the charred tail was still largely intact. China Central Television said eight of the victims were found 20m to 30m from the plane’s wreckage in a muddy field.
Xinhua said officials had earlier reported 43 dead because one body was torn apart in the crash and had been counted as two. It said the pilot, Qi Quanjun (齊全軍), survived the crash but was badly hurt and cannot speak.
One survivor told Xinhua that there was strong turbulence just after the announcement that the plane was about to land.
“There were four or five bad turbulence [jolts] and luggage in the overhead bin was raining down,” he was quoted as saying. “Everyone panicked. Those sitting in the back began rushing to the front of the cabin.”
“There was smog, which I knew was toxic. I held my breath and ran until I saw a burning hole on one side of the cabin. I crawled out and ran at least 100m to ensure I was safe,” he said.
One of the dead was a Chinese with a foreign passport, according to Xinhua, but it did not give the nationality.
It also said a Taiwanese passenger was hurt.
Five of those on board were children, the Civil Aviation Administration of China said, and at least one, an eight-year-old boy, survived.
The Brazilian-made Embraer E-190 jet had taken off from Harbin shortly before 9pm and crashed a little more than an hour later while arriving at Yichun, a city of about 1 million people 160km from the Russian border.
Eighteen officials from China’s Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security and various provincial branches were on the flight, headed to a meeting in Yichun, Xinhua said.
It said Vice Minister Sun Baoshu (孫寶樹) was in critical condition with broken bones and head injuries.
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