TransAsia Airways plane crashes in typhoon-hit Taiwan, killing 47
Thursday, 24 July 2014 00:01
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Reuters:A TransAsia Airways turboprop plane crashed on its second attempt at landing during a thunderstorm on an island off Taiwan on Wednesday, killing 47 people and setting buildings on fire, officials said.
The plane, a 70-seat ATR 72, crashed near the runway on the island of Penghu, west of the mainland, with 54 passengers and four crew on board, they said. No one was killed or hurt in the buildings.
Eleven injured people on the plane were taken to hospital, the government said.
The aircraft took off from Taiwan’s southern city of Kaohsiung, headed for the island of Makong, but crash-landed in Huxi township of Penghu County, the main island of the chain also known as the Pescadores.
“It was thunderstorm conditions during the crash,” said Hsi Wen-guang, a spokesman for the Penghu County Government Fire Bureau. TransAsia Airways is a Taiwan-based airline with a fleet of around 23 Airbus and ATR aircraft, operating chiefly short-haul flights on domestic routes as well as to mainland China, Japan, Thailand and Cambodia, among its Asian destinations.
