Plane Crash lands in Iran, 46 Injured

TEHRAN: An Iranian passenger plane caught fire on Sunday as it was landing in the northeastern city of Mashhad, injuring at least 46 people on board, state television reported.

Iranian officials told local news networks that the rear end of the Russian-built Tupolev 154 plane belonging to Taban Airline caught fire as the aircraft was landing at Mashhad airport.

“The plane went off the runaway upon landing and part of its rear end broke away,” state television quoted as saying Javad Erfanian, head of disaster management of Khorasan Razavi province of which Mashhad is the capital.

“Forty-six people have been injured, but most of them are not serious.”

The English language state-owned television said the plane, traveling from Abadan located in southwest Iran to Mashhad, had 157 passengers on board. Erfanian said the plane also had 13 crew members on board.

Reza Jafarzadeh, spokesman of Iranian civil aviation, said the plane had left Abadan on Saturday, but bad weather in Mashhad led to the aircraft landing in the central city of Isfahan for the night before it took off again for Mashhad early Sunday.

“The captain had a critical patient on board and so had do an emergency landing (in Mashhad) which is why the aircraft met with an accident,” he was quoted as saying on the website of state television.