Plane crashes while landing in Taiwan; 47 dead.
A TransAsia Airways aircraft crashed while making its second emergency landing attempt during a storm on an island near Taiwan on Wednesday; 47 people died and buildings were set on fire; the ATR 72 model aircraft was carrying 54 passengers and four crew members.
TAIPEI (Reuters) A TransAsia Airways domestic flight crashed on its second landing attempt during a storm on an island near Taiwan on Wednesday, killing 47 people and setting buildings ablaze, local authorities said.
An ATR 72 aircraft, with a capacity for 70 passengers, crashed near the runway on Penghu Island, west of the main island, with 54 passengers and four crew members on board, sources said. No one was killed or injured in the buildings that caught fire.
Eleven injured people on board the plane were taken to the hospital, the government said.
The aircraft had taken off from the city of Kaohsiung in southern Taiwan and was heading for Makong Island, but crashed while attempting to land in Huxi Township, in the Penghu District, the main island in the Pescadores mountain range.
"Conditions were stormy at the time of the accident," said His Wen-guang, a spokesman for the Penghu fire department.
"We sent 11 people with injuries from the accident site to the hospital. Some buildings adjacent to the runway caught fire, but there was no one inside at the time and the fire was extinguished," he added.
Typhoon Matmo hit Taiwan on Wednesday, bringing heavy rain and winds and shutting down everything from financial markets to schools.
(Reporting by Michael Gold; Writing by Nick Macfie)