BREAKING: Passenger Airline Crashes; 47 Reportedly Killed

Daniel Doherty | July 23, 2014 9:45 AM

**See updates below**

Another tragedy this week: a civilian airliner carrying 58 people crashed in Taiwan on Wednesday, killing nearly everyone on board:

BREAKING: Taiwanese news agency: Plane crashes in emergency landing, killing 51 people, injuring 7.
— The Associated Press (@AP) July 23, 2014

Taiwan's Central News Agency says a plane has crashed in a failed emergency landing, killing 51 people.

The news agency cited the head of the fire department in the Taiwanese county of Penghu as saying that seven people were also injured in the crash.

The report cites the Civil Aviation Administration as saying the flight crashed Wednesday with 54 passengers and four flight crew and was operated by a Taiwanese airline, TransAsia Airways.

The report says the plane likely crashed when an attempt to make an emergency landing in the city of Magong.

Developing…

UPDATE: It appears "heavy rain" might have prompted the attempted emergency landing:

Taiwan was battered by Typhoon Matmo early Tuesday morning, and the Central Weather Bureau was advising of heavy rain through the evening, even though the center of the storm was in mainland China.

The flight was heading from the capital, Taipei, to the island Penghu, halfway between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan in the Taiwan Strait. Pictures from the airport showed a handful of firefighters using flashlights to look at wreckage in the darkness.

The island's local fire chief put the death toll at 45 while media reports said 47 were killed.
"The control tower lost contact with the aircraft soon after they requested a go-around (second attempt to land)," Chen told reporters.

The commercial domestic flight was carrying 54 passengers and four crew, officials said.

It was flying from Kaohsiung and had been delayed due to bad weather, according to Shen.