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KHARTOUM: At least 28 people died when a passenger jet caught fire
after landing at Khartoum airport, officials said on Wednesday, with
dozens more still missing as authorities probe the cause of the
accident.
The bodies of 28 people who burned to death
when the Sudan Airways Airbus A310 caught fire late Tuesday have
been taken to Khartoum’s morgue, a Sudanese official said, adding
that 121 people survived the accident.
State television previously reported that
nearly half of the 203 passengers were killed when the plane from
Amman burst into flames after one of its engines exploded on
landing. The plane was carrying 11 crewmembers.
“At present, we have 28 bodies at Khartoum
morgue,” said Taher al-Haj Ibrahim, the general director of
investigations. “For now, we have counted 121 survivors,” he
said, adding that 22 of them were injured.
“The rest we consider as missing, but
according to our information, some passengers went home before they
could be counted.”
Sudanese authorities were to launch an official
inquiry into the cause of the accident, television reported, amid
contradictory reports that either weather or a technical failure was
to blame.
Airport authorities said an engine caught fire,
spreading to the fuselage, while survivors said weather conditions
at the time of the landing were poor, with the capital hit by a
sandstorm and then heavy showers.
--AFP
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