Bhoja Air’s inaugural flight from Karachi to Islamabad crashed just three kilometres away from the Islamabad airport late on Friday evening, resulting in the deaths of 127 people on board, including six crew members.
The crashing plane also razed to ground some houses in the Hussain Abad area, a suburb of the twin cities, minutes before it was to land at the Islamabad International Airport in unfavourable-to-fly conditions.
The weather in Islamabad region was windy, cloudy and it was raining, however, no casualty was reported on the ground.
Friday’s air crash is the second of a private airline’s plane in the last two years.
Six children, five infants, 68 women and 53 men were onboard the unfortunate Islamabad-bound flight.
President Asif Ali Zardari was among several important personalities expressing grief over the tragedy and asked for an enquiry report immediately.
PIA announced that it would fly the family members of the crash victims from Karachi to Islamabad in the morning today (Saturday).
The plane, a 27-year-old Boeing 737-200, took off from Karachi airport at 5pm and was supposed to land at the Islamabad Airport at 7pm, but harsh weather barred the plane from making it to the runway without an accident.
According to sources in the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), the plane lost contact with the Air Traffic Control at 6:40pm after it was given clearance to land.
Captain Noor Afridi was flying the plane in which, according to the CAA sources, no foreigner was travelling.
Witnesses said the plane was up in flames even before it crashed to the ground.
Military and civilian rescue teams, including Civil Defence, Rescue 1122 and Islamabad Police, rushed to the site of the accident immediately after it occurred. An emergency was declared in military and civil hospitals, as the Young Doctors’ Association also called off its strike to join the rescue operation.
The wreckage of the plane was scattered across a radius of over a kilometre. Rescue teams said several of the recovered bodies of passengers were beyond recognition. Sniffer dogs had also been called in to help find the dead.
Reports said rescue officials had succeeded in locating the plane’s black box.
Bhoja Air had only just re-launched its domestic operations with a fleet of five 737s in March this year and Friday’s flight to Islamabad was its first from Karachi since. The airline had been grounded in 2000 by the CAA amid financial difficulties, reports said.
Long queues of cars and people were seen scuttling in and around the Islamabad airport, waiting to hear some hopeful news about the ill-fated flight.
A man who had been waiting at the Benazir Bhutto International Airport for the flight only managed to scream “my two daughters are dead”, tears running down his face. He then collapsed to the floor in shock and sat silently as other relatives of passengers crowded around lists of those on board. An uncle of the sisters, 18 and 20, said they were supposed to return to Islamabad on Sunday, but flew early to see an aunt who was visiting from London.
“We don’t even know when or where we will get to see their bodies,” said the uncle, Qamar Abbas, who kept mumbling “no, no, no” to himself. Nearby, relatives of passengers hugged each other and sobbed. One man cried “my kids, my kids”.
Among them was Zarina Bibi, desperate to determine whether her husband was on the flight. “He called me before leaving Karachi but I don’t know if he was on this flight,” she said, eyes red from crying.
“There is no chance of any survivors. It will be only a miracle. The plane is totally destroyed,” police official Fazle Akbar told a foreign news agency.
Rescue crews were combing through the charred wreckage of the plane through the night, as TV footages kept showing passengers’ belongings – clothes, shoes, jewellery – and disbelieving relatives up in wails.
Former CAA DG Junaid Ameen said bad weather was usually not the cause of plane crashes, because planes had equipment which helped deal with the situation. “Planes are designed to fly in bad weather.”
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Video link from Express News Channel
Video link from Samaa TV Channel
Video link from ARY News Channel
