At least 21 dead in Kazakhstan plane crash

  • 11 years ago
ROUGH CUT (NO REPORTER NARRATION)

STORY: A passenger plane crashed in thick fog near Kazakhstan's commercial capital Almaty on Tuesday and broke into pieces when it hit the ground, killing all 21 people on board.

After several hours, rescue teams recovered the plane's flight recorder, the central communications service for Kazakhstan's president said on its Twitter page.

A list published by the prosecutor general's office showed there had been 16 passengers and five crew members on board.

The Canadian-built Bombardier Challenger CRJ-200 belonged to private Kazakh airline SCAT. It came down near the village of Kyzyl Tu about 5 km (3 miles) from Almaty's airport.

Tractors and other heavy vehicles were being used to cut paths through the snow to the wreckage but journalists were kept at a distance from the crash site.

The plane had been on its way from the city of Kokshetau in northern Kazakhstan to Almaty in the southeast.

SCAT, which has been operating since 1997, runs an extensive domestic service and has some international flights.

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