Plane With 100 On Board Crashes

A plane with 100 people on board has crashed in Kazakhstan, killing at least fourteen people, Naija News understands.

According to officials, the Bek Air aircraft went down shortly after taking off at Almaty airport on Friday morning local time.

There was heavy fog in the area, a Reuters reporter close to the scene said, On the other hand, the airport said there were survivors.

This online news platform understands the plane was en route from Almaty, the largest city in Kazakhstan, to the country’s capital of Nur-Sultan. The cause of the crash is not known.

Giving an update on the crash, Almaty’s airport said there were 95 passengers and five crew on board.

The airport said the plane lost height at 07:22 local time (01:22 GMT), before striking a concrete barrier and crashing into a two-story building but there was no fire upon impact.

According to Flightradar24 aviation information website, the flight departed at 01:21 GMT, and “the last signal was received in that same minute”.

The Flightradar24 aviation information website said Bek Air Flight Z92100 was a Fokker 100 plane.

Footage has emerged of rescuers working at the scene. In it, a woman can be heard calling for an ambulance and the cockpit of the plane is seen wedged into the side of the building, a BBC report said.

Naija News learned that a special commission will be set up to determine the cause of the crash.

Speaking on the crash, Qasym-Jomart Toqayev, Kazakhstan’s President expressed “deep condolences” to the victims’ relatives. He also said that “all those responsible will be severely punished in accordance with the law”.

Meanwhile, Naija News understands that the crash is coming a month after 27 people died when a military plane carrying senior Kazakh security officials crashed in the south of the country.

This is not the first serious plane crash in the city. On 29 January 2013, a passenger plane travelling from the northern town of Kokshetau came down near Almaty, killing 20 people.

Bek Air was founded in 1999, targeting VIP flight operations, the company’s website says.