A passenger plane with 72 people on board crashed near the airport in the city of Aktau in western Kazakhstan. the Ministry of Emergency Situations said on Wednesday. According to preliminary information, six people survived the accident, reports TASR according to Reuters, TASS and Sky News.
The Kazinform agency reported that on board the passenger plane there were up to 105 passengers and five crew members. Meanwhile, the Kazakh Ministry of Transport referred to data from the Azerbaijani side spoke of 62 passengers and five crew members.
At the site of the collapse, according to the Kazakh authorities, 52 firefighters with 11 pieces of equipment tried to put out the fire. According to them, the plane belonged to Azerbaijan Airlines. The company says the Embraer 190 “emergency landed” about three kilometers from Aktau. The plane was headed from Baku to the Russian city of Grozny, but was diverted to Makhachkala on the west coast of the Caspian Sea due to fog, Grozny Airport confirmed.
