British Jet Crashes En Route to Ireland

LONDON--A jetliner bound for Northern Ireland with 126 people aboard slammed into a highway embankment in central England yesterday while trying to make an emergency landing, authorities said. At least 32 people were reported killed, and another 76 injured.

The Civil Aviation Authority said the British Midland Airways Boeing 737-400 was en route from London's Heathrow Airport to Belfast, Northern Ireland, when it developed engine trouble.

The British Broadcasting Corp. said the pilot reported an engine on fire.

It was the second major plane crash in Britain in three weeks. On Dec. 21, a Pan Am jet bound for New York from London blew up over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing all 259 people on board and 11 on the ground. That jet had also just departed from Heathrow. A bomb was blamed for the crash. The two crashes are apparently unrelated.

The aircraft was trying to land at East Midlands Airport near Nottingham, about 100 miles north of London, when it hit an embankment beside the highway, the airline said. The plane broke apart on impact.

Police in the county of Derbyshire reported several bodies scattered on each side of the highway. The British Broadcasting Corp. reported 10 dead. The local fire brigade and police reported some fatalities but did not give figures.

The Derby Royal Infirmary hospital said it was treating 27 casualties, none critical, most of them suffering fractures. It said it expected 30 more.

British Midland chairperson Michael Bishop said 117 passengers and eight crew were aboard. Police and the Civil Aviation Authority put the number at 126.

After the plane hit the embankment at 8:30 (GMT), the tail section embedded in the ground and the fuselage broke away and was scattered over nearby fields, said Inspector Neville Cotterill of the police in the city of Leicester.

He said there were "considerable injuries," but he said no cars were known to have been hit as the plane thundered alongside the M1, England's main north-south highway. The highway remained partly open to traffic, he said.

Bishop said the pilot reported "severe vibrations in one of the engines" and asked clearance for an emergency landing at East Midlands Airport.

"He undershot the runway," Bishop said. He said the company had taken delivery of the plane only 12 weeks ago.

Civil Aviation Authority spokesperson Ann Noonan said survivors were being removed from the aircraft.

She said the pilot reported problems in one engine and was having trouble climbing. The twin-engine aircraft disappeared off radar screens at 8:15, she said.

Thirty ambulances clustered around the wreck as firefighters doused it with foam. Airport Manager Terry Lovatt told the BBC he saw "a handful" of survivors walking away from the broken tail section down the embankment.

The Boeing 737-400 which crashed yesterday is a version of the Boeing 737 with a longer fuselage and can carry 146 passengers. It was introduced last year.