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9 dead in Turkish plane crash in Amsterdam |
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Written by Agencies
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Wednesday, 25 February 2009 13:05 |
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A Turkish Airlines plane carrying 134 people has crashed on landing at Amsterdam's Schiphol international airport. At least 9 people died, 50 injured.
Officials said it was unclear why the plane, en route from Istanbul, crashed. Schiphol Airport spokesman Rudd Wecer told that the plane came down a couple of hundred metres short of a runway, in normal weather conditions.
Television pictures showed the aircraft, a Boeing 737-800, lying fractured into three parts after it slammed into the grass. The aircraft did not catch fire.
Images showed the crumpled plane in three parts, with the tail section of the fuselage broken off, and a wide crack in the fuselage just behind the cockpit about 3 miles from the runway. The airliner had not caught fire. Turkish Airlines flight TK1951 had left Istanbul at 8:22 a.m. on Wednesday. The crash took place in calm weather with a light drizzle.
Tuncer Mutlucan, a passenger who survived the crash, told NTV, “It was the back of the plane that hit the ground. We left the plane from the back. My colleague and I saw people stuck in between seats as we were trying to leave and we tried to help them.” “ It all happened in something like ten seconds,” Mr. Mutlucan said.
Another passenger told Turkey's NTV television that the plane lost height suddenly as it came into land, striking the ground tail first. "We were at an altitude of 600 metres when we heard the announcement that we were landing," Kerem Uzel said. "We suddenly descended a great distance as if the plane fell into turbulence. The plane's tail hit the ground."
Another passenger, Tuncer Mutluhan, told NTV: "While we were making a normal landing, it felt like we fell into a void, the plane lost control, suddenly plunged and crashed." This happened "in three or five seconds".
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