A TransAsia ATR-72 turboprop flying from Taipei Songshan Airport in Taiwan to Kinmen, Taiwan, crashed shortly after takeoff today.
Footage of the crash was captured on video, amazingly enough:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDqkW2iuWwc
Of the 58 passengers, only 12 are confirmed dead. While any loss of life is incredibly tragic, it looks like it could have ended a lot worse. My thoughts are with those onboard and their families and friends. It’s always horrible when stuff like this happens.
The footage is fascinating, at least. And terrifying. Though not as terrifying as this 747 footage from about a year ago in Afghanistan:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIjO0sKBDDw
Curious to see what the cause of this accident was. Since there’s some video footage and survivors, hopefully this is a swifter investigation than we’ve seen with the past few air disasters.
Lucky escape for some but thoughts go out for those who are dead or missing...terrible incident
Unfortunately, the death toll now stands at 31 with still 12 unaccounted for. There are 15 survivors according to latest reports. Very, very sad - thoughts are with families and friends.
Well they landed in a river, which is both bad and good. Good in that the water reduced the risk of post crash fire, bad in the fact that a lot of the passengers have probably ended up drowned instead.
Unless both engines was out a commercial airplane should be able to at least maintain altitude and make it back to a runway.
By the video it looks like the left propeller is not working. Engine failure???
@Mrs N- Thanks for sharing this, it does add quite a bit to the context of this incident. I happen to be very familiar with plane performance close to stalling speed, so I knew when I saw the video that the turn was initiated by, and was the intention of the pilots. It takes a lot to make a maneuver like this, and it was very impressive. The only question to be answered, though, is...
@Mrs N- Thanks for sharing this, it does add quite a bit to the context of this incident. I happen to be very familiar with plane performance close to stalling speed, so I knew when I saw the video that the turn was initiated by, and was the intention of the pilots. It takes a lot to make a maneuver like this, and it was very impressive. The only question to be answered, though, is why the plane ended up in such urgent situation. Twin-engine passenger planes are supposed to be able to take off safely with one engine out past V1.
I'm really glad to hear that you and your family missed that incident by a few minutes. And may those who perished rest in peace.
Travel safe fellows.
@Norman - the driver of the car with the dashcam said the same thing as you - the plane was originally over a busy commercial district and appeared to intentionally turn. Adjacent to that highway is a business park that house the headquarters of the Chinatrust Bank as well as the Taiwan offices of Yahoo, HP, etc. and several residential high rises that are under construction. Taipei is a densely populated city and the river...
@Norman - the driver of the car with the dashcam said the same thing as you - the plane was originally over a busy commercial district and appeared to intentionally turn. Adjacent to that highway is a business park that house the headquarters of the Chinatrust Bank as well as the Taiwan offices of Yahoo, HP, etc. and several residential high rises that are under construction. Taipei is a densely populated city and the river is literally the only place in the flight route that isn't full of people.
According to Reuters they are saying it was an engine flame out/stall.
Lucky,
That was actually a very good maneuver by the pilots IMO. They had control with the plane was flying only margin above stalling, and did an intentional left turn(though at that point it was impossible to have that turn under control) which eventually led themselves to the river and not the bridge and cars and people that was in front of them.
I travelled along the exact same route as the taxi that got clipped while sending my kids to day care about 5 minutes before the crash occurred.
The death toll will likely rise as the 12 quoted is from the 20+ already rescued/retrieved from the water. Another 30 or so are unaccounted for and are likely trapped within the plane. The black boxes have already been recovered.
@lucky I just opened an article and it said that the number of fatalities increased to 23 instead of 12
Saw this last night... So tragic
They crashed into Kilong River I heard
first vid you have in your post is now labeled "private", fyi
@ brian -- Looks like they took it down. Added another one.
Pretty insensitive to say 'only' 12 dead Lucky....
@ Ben S -- Did you read the sentence after that? Nothing good about 12 people dying, which is horrible, but if you just saw that video would you assume that fewer than a quarter of the passengers were killed by the crash?
It is not "amazing"......
What is going on in Asia? This seems to be a monthly occurrence now.
Regarding the second video.... According to this topic on a.net the NTSB opened an accident docket.
It appears part of the cargo in the rear (a military vehicle) broke loose and caused the crash:
http://www.airliners.net/aviation-forums/general_aviation/read.main/6304994/
Here is video from another dash cam further away of the Taiwan crash:
https://www.youtube.com/watch/?v=-MMzCwzXMQY
Here is a slightly clearer video of the footage in the post:
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10152660854612934
Regarding the second video.... According to this topic on a.net the NTSB opened an accident docket.
It appears part of the cargo in the rear (a military vehicle) broke loose and caused the crash:
http://www.airliners.net/aviation-forums/general_aviation/read.main/6304994/
Here is video from another dash cam further away of the Taiwan crash:
https://www.youtube.com/watch/?v=-MMzCwzXMQY
Here is a slightly clearer video of the footage in the post:
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10152660854612934
"Another ATR 72 operated by the same Taipei-based airline crashed in the outlying Taiwan-controlled islands of Penghu last July 23, killing 48 at the end of a typhoon for reasons that are still under investigation."
Terrible news but your information is wrong. The plane was flying to Kinmen (KNH) and not Xiamen. It's the large island to the right of Xiamen on the map
@ Andrew -- Thanks, fixed.