Three killed in Garuda plane crash

Three killed in Garuda plane crash

FUKUOKA, Japan (Agencies): A Garuda Indonesia DC-10 jet sat
engulfed in flames following a failed takeoff yesterday, with
three confirmed dead and scores injured.

Survivors, some with their hair singed, had escaped from the
blazing passenger cabin after the aircraft careered off the
runway and across a public road before coming to a halt.

There were 260 passengers and 15 crew on board the GA865
flight from Fukuoka airport in southwest Japan, which was bound
for Denpasar and later, Jakarta.

A hundred people were injured, including pilot Ronald R.
Longdong. All Garuda crew members survived.

As of yesterday evening, the authorities had not released the
names or nationalities of the dead passengers. A Japanese
transport ministry official said all but two of the passengers
where Japanese. The two foreigners were Indonesian.

In Jakarta, Garuda Indonesia President Soepandi told reporters
that the crash occurred after an engine located at the rear fin
caught fire.

Garuda and the Ministry of Transportation were dispatching a
joint team to handle the crash and carry out an investigation.
"I'm also heading for Fukuoka," Soepandi said.

According to Reuters, survivors said panic broke out on the
18-year-old plane as first smoke and then flames spread through
the passenger cabin, which was packed with mainly Japanese
holidaymakers, including honeymooners, bound for Bali.

"The fire started from the port side of the cabin. We tried to
follow the evacuation directions from the flight attendant, but
that was the direction the flames were coming from," a young male
passenger told television stations.

Survivors said the plane ascended just a few meters and then
suddenly crashed at the end of the runway with one or two jarring
bumps.

The aircraft skidded off the runway over a road open to
regular pedestrian and car traffic and came to a halt on a grassy
buffer zone on the other side.

While the plane skidded, it veered sharply to the right. It
overran the runway by about 500 meters, stopping only several
hundred meters away from houses.

The plane's landing gear and the two wing engines broke off,
ending up dozens of yards from the plane.

One passenger, Kazumi Yoshitake, 28, said there was a
vibration before the plane crashed on the runway.

"At first I thought the plane was going through the usual
vibrations when taking off, but suddenly there was a huge shock
and I could feel the plane shaking heavily," he said.

"Luggage started to fall from the overhead racks and I heard
this terrible metallic, scraping noise when the plane hit the
ground," Yoshitake said.

Some passengers flung themselves down emergency escape chutes
with their hair catching fire as flight attendants helped them to
flee. Others crawled through cracks in the fuselage on to the
plane's wings and jumped to the ground.

Some passengers said the flight attendants did the best they
could, but there was some chaos during the evacuation because of
language difficulties.

Others however said the Indonesian stewardesses were too
panicked during the crises, The Jakarta Post special
correspondent Seiichi Okawa reported from Tokyo last night.

"They didn't lead the passengers," Toshihiro Aizano, a
survivor, told the Asahi Shimbun.

"The flight attendants can only speak a little Japanese, which
is why we have an interpreter on the plane," Garuda's Tokyo
spokesman Tadahisa Yotsumoto told reporters.

The plane pulled away from the airport terminal at about noon
(0300 GMT) and started its takeoff run 10 minutes later. Within
30 minutes, the fire had gutted the passenger cabin, with flames
leaping up to 10 feet (three metres) into the air.

About 30 fire engines frantically sprayed foam nonstop onto
the burning fuselage as passengers were still jumping out.

One female passenger said: "I did not know where the emergency
exits were when the plane stopped. People were falling down. I
tried to get out as quickly as possible, because the fire was
spreading quickly inside."

"I didn't see any flames at first, so I didn't think it was
too bad an accident. But suddenly the smoke and flames were
everywhere," another female passenger said.

Weather conditions at the time of the accident were favorable.

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