December 24, 2005 - 13:46 AMT
23 Killed in Plane Crash near Baku
18 passengers and 5 members of the crew died as a result of a airplane crash near Baku (Nardaran village, outskirts Baku) on Friday at 10:27 PM local time. AN-100-140 airliner, belonging to AZAL state company, took off Heydar Aliyev international airport at 10:19 PM local time to execute Baku-Aktau flight. Within several minutes the communication with the aircraft interrupted and it disappeared from the display of the radars. Within 8 minutes of the flight the operator at the airports received a signal on the crash of AN-100-140. To diminish the scale of the crash the pilots directed the airliner to the sea. Zakir Garalov, the Prosecutor General of Azerbaijan, Vice Premier Abid Sharifov, employees of the Interior Ministry and the Ministry of National Security arrived to the occurrence location in a few minutes. A special commission has been formed to launch investigation into the case.

The search of the flight recorder of AN-100-140, which crashed near Baku on Friday night, continues, reported Rustam Usubov, the First Deputy Prosecutor General of Azerbaijan. In Usubov's words, the causes of the crash are not known yet. The initial data excludes any possibility of terror attack. The First Deputy Prosecutor General of Azerbaijan confirmed the reports that all 18 passengers and 5 members of the crew died and their corpses were sent for examination.

According to latest reports corpses of 20 of 23 victims of the crash near Baku are found, Togrul Rahimov, the head of the Sabunchi District Police Department, reported from the occurrence location. According to Rahimov, it was not so difficult to extract the corpses as the plane crashed down on the seashore. Nevertheless, the remains of three persons are not found yet, though their names are identified. Thus, the search continues, he added. Moreover, the work over extraction of remains of the airliner and search of the flight recorder continue. Experts of the Prosecutor General's Office, the Interior Ministry and AZAL state company continue work at the site of occurrence, reported Trend agency.