PM Khan says ‘deeply saddened’ as Chinese plane crashes in mountains with 132 on board

Police officers stand guard at the entrance of a village leading to the site of a plane crash in Tengxian county, Wuzhou city, in China's southern Guangxi region on March 21, 2022. (AFP)

• The China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737-800 crashed in the mountains in southern China on a domestic flight
• China Eastern said cause of crash, in which plane descended at 31,000 feet a minute, was being probed

ISLAMABAD: Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan said on Monday he was “deeply saddened” as a China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737-800 with 132 people on board crashed in the mountains in southern China on a domestic flight.
Media have said there was no sign of survivors. President Xi Jinping called for investigators to determine the cause of the crash as soon as possible, state broadcaster CCTV reported.
“Deeply saddened by the tragic loss of lives in the passenger plane crash in China,” Khan said on Twitter. “We share the grief of our Chinese brothers and sisters and convey our deepest condolences and sympathies with the bereaved families.”
The plane crashed en route from the southwestern city of Kunming, capital of Yunnan province, to Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong, bordering Hong Kong.
China Eastern said the cause of the crash, in which the plane descended at 31,000 feet a minute according to flight tracking website FlightRadar24, was under investigation.
Media cited a rescue official as saying the plane had disintegrated and caused a fire destroying bamboo trees. The People’s Daily quoted a provincial firefighting department official as saying there was no sign of life among the debris.
The aircraft, with 123 passengers and nine crew on board, lost contact over the city of Wuzhou, China’s Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) and the airline said. The flight left Kunming at 1:11 p.m. (0511 GMT), FlightRadar24 data showed, and had been due to land in Guangzhou at 3:05 p.m. (0705 GMT).
The plane, which Flightradar24 said was six years old, had been cruising at 29,100 feet at 0620 GMT. Just over two minutes and 15 seconds later, data showed it had descended to 9,075 feet.
Twenty seconds later, its last tracked altitude was 3,225 feet.