CRASH: Sibir Airbus A-390 (?) Russian Airliner

[Blaine Thompson]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13773633/

Russian airliner crashes in Siberia, officials say
Plane with 200 aboard bursts into flames after landing, 150 feared killed

BREAKING NEWS

Updated: 5 minutes ago

MOSCOW - More than 150 people died early Sunday when an aircraft crashed
in the Siberian city of Irkutsk, the Interfax news agency reported,
quoting a preliminary toll from the regional prosecutor's office.

The report said that the dead were believed to include the eight crew
onboard the plane, which was carrying 200 people.

The Sibir Airbus A-390 crashed on landing and burst into flames,
Emergency Situations Ministry spokeswoman Irina Andrianova said earlier.

“The aircraft veered off the runway on landing. It was traveling at a
terrific speed,” Andrianova said.

Andrianova said 43 people had been hospitalized and another 10 managed
to escape. Most of the other passengers were feared dead, she said.

The aircraft was on a flight from Moscow to Irkutsk, near Lake Baikal.

It took five emergency services more than two hours to extinguish the
flames, Andrianova said.

Stay tuned to MSNBC.com for more details on this developing story.

© 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not
be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

[Mike Tobin]

Post by Blaine Thompson
The Sibir Airbus A-390 crashed on landing and burst into flames,

CNN is also calling it an A-390.

Kudos to BBC for saying its an A-310. But they have a picture of an
Air India A-310 (which they admit is of Air India)

[Blaine Thompson]

Post by Mike Tobin

Post by Blaine Thompson
The Sibir Airbus A-390 crashed on landing and burst into flames,

CNN is also calling it an A-390.

I was trying to figure out what an A-390 was, but I gave up and decided
it was a reporter error - somewhere between his chair and his keyboard :-)

- Blaine

[Mike Tobin]

Post by Blaine Thompson
I was trying to figure out what an A-390 was, but I gave up and
decided
it was a reporter error - somewhere between his chair and his
keyboard :-)

Yep. They are updating with correct aircraft now.

BBC has a partial image of the Sibir aircraft on fire
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5162082.stm


The Baikal television station
http://as.baikal.tv/news/new.html?newsid=200607091
says it is Sibir flight 778 from Moscow, with 188 passengers. Unknown
number of crew.

I can't understand everything, but I have the sense the plane left
the runway, hit a concrete obstacle and ran into construction. The
forward part of the Airbus appeared to be destroyed and passengers
exited out of rear doors. Another witness observed no one and then
the plane burst into flames from inside the aircraft. One passenger
describes what seems to be routine touchdown "began to stop,...then
we fly up." It sounds as if the plane rolled over rough land and then
the passenger (saw?) a wing catch a fence. She was helped out of the
plane and I'm understanding her say the slide did not inflate.

Another story says 49 persons have been taken to hospital, and
townspeople are gathering meals and a search party and the airport
should soon have a hotline telephone number. Psychologists are
assisting.

An update: 1 pilot and 1 flight attendant have survived. Unknown
about the other 6. (Interfax earlier had 8, Baikal TV confirms it)
Now they say the plane ended up in private garages and the fuel
remaining (one ton) caught fire. There were 2 explosions.

The TV station is doing a lot of updates. An airport press conference
says the 2 black boxes have been recovered. Itkutsk airport is closed
and flights are being diverted to Bratsk.