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Plane crash kills 54 in north China
2004-11-21 07:18:04 


The Bombardier CRJ200 aircraft
HOHHOT, Nov. 21(Xinhuanet)-- Fifty-four people died when a small passenger plane of China Eastern crashed in a park lake immediately after takeoff Sunday morning in Baotou, a city in north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.

The accident happened at about 8:20 a.m. when the Mu 5210 flight was headed for Shanghai.

By 17:10 p.m., the remains of the victims, including 47 passengers, six crew members and an elderly worker with the Nanhai Park, have all been found. Among the dead, there was an Indonesian passenger and the rest were all Chinese.

Witnesses said that the plane broke into flaming fragments. A witness named Wang Yongqiang said when he was in the park, he suddenly saw the nearby plane shake and black smoke then came out from the tail before it fell to the ground. He also said he heard a large bang when the plane was in the air.

"If the plane flew at lower level, it would have fallen into the nearby residential quarter."

An anonymous witness said that the aircraft exploded with a big fire ball when it rose to about 100 meters above the ground.

Six rescue teams consisting of more than 100 fire fighters were dispatched to the scene to retrieve the victims' remains from the lake.

According to Luo Yongqiang, head of the city's fire brigade, the weather was clear in Baotou but the temperature was rather lowand the lake was full of pieces of ice.

Hospitals in Baotou have made immediate arrangements to receivethe remains of victims.

Health authorities of the autonomous region have arranged a team of specialists, who rushed to the site from Hohhot, the region's capital, on Sunday afternoon, said local health administrators.

CRJ-200, one of the CRJ(Canada Regional Jet) series, is a branch-line civilian aircraft supplied by the Bombardier Aerospacebased in Canada. It accommodates 50 seats.

No name list of the victims is currently available now.

More than 30 family members of the victims have rushed to Baotou Airport and been received by the airport staff. The family members have been settled down at the Tianshi(Angel) Tower near the airport.

The People's Insurance Company of China, the insurer of the crashed plane, has sent a special work team to deal with the related claims in the accident.

The rescue group is continuing to search for the flight data recorder and plane fragments.

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