Posted by By DANIEL BALINT-KURTI on
A Nigerian passenger jet crashed in the southern city of Port Harcourt on Saturday, a civil aviation official said. At least 56 people were killed, reports said.
LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) -- A Nigerian passenger jet crashed in the southern city of Port Harcourt on Saturday, a civil aviation official said. At least 56 people were killed, reports said.
The Sosoliso Airlines flight from Abuja "crash landed and burst into flames" with 110 people on board, the radio station Rhythm FM reported. Fifty-six bodies have been recovered and seven people were taken to the hospital, the report said.
Sam Adurogboye, a spokesman for the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority, confirmed to The Associated Press that a plane had crashed but he said he had no further details.
"Yes, there was a crash... We are trying to establish contact with Port Harcourt," he said.
The cause of the crash was unclear.
In October, an Abuja-bound Boeing 737-200 crashed after taking off from the airport at Lagos, Nigeria's biggest city, killing 117 people on board the Bellview Airlines flight.
The exact cause of that crash remains unclear, but U.S. investigators sent to help with the investigation ruled out terrorism, an official at Nigeria's Aviation Ministry said last month.
Nigerian-owned Sosoliso Airlines was established in 1994. It began scheduled flights as a domestic airline in July 2000 and now flies to six Nigerian cities, according to its Web site.