Chinese plane carrying 132 people crashes

A Chinese airline – Eastern Airlines jetliner – with 132 people aboard has crashed in the mountains in southern China’s Guangxi region, CNN is reporting.

The incident, which happened Monday afternoon (China time), was announced by China’s Civil Aviation Administration (CAAC) in a statement posted online.

The Boeing-737 was en route from the southwestern city of Kunming to Guangzhou when it lost contact over the city of Wuzhou. There were 123 passengers and nine crew members on board, CAAC said.

Rescue teams are en route to the accident scene, where there is fire visible on-site, but the casualties are unknown, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV reported. Initial state media reports had indicated there were 133 people on board.

Footage posted online and shared by state media People’s Daily show plumes of smoke billowing from a mountainous, forested area. Another clip shows what appears to be wreckage from the plane on a muddy, mountain path.

The CAAC said in a statement that a rescue team has been dispatched to the crash site.

“The Civil Aviation Administration of China Eastern airlines has activated the emergency response mechanism after a Boeing 737 crashed,” the CAAC said in its statement.

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Chiamaka Okafor is a reporter at Premium Times in partnership with Report for the World, which matches local newsrooms with talented emerging journalists to report on under-covered issues around the globe.