No survivors in Cuba airliner crash with 68 aboard

airliner crash in Cuba

GUASIMAL, Cuba  – A state airliner filled with Cubans and travelers from Europe and Latin America crashed and burst into flames in a mountainous area after declaring an emergency and losing contact with air traffic controllers, the island's worst air disaster in more than 20 years.

All 40 Cubans and 28 foreigners aboard died, authorities announced early Friday.

AeroCaribbean Flight 883 was en route from the eastern city of Santiago de Cuba to the capital when it reported an emergency at 5:42 p.m. local time Thursday, then lost contact with air traffic controllers. It went down near Guasimal, a village in Sancti Spiritus province, carrying 61 passengers and a crew of seven.

Cuba's Civil Aviation Authority issued a statement hours later saying there were no survivors. It released a list of passengers that included nine Argentines, seven Mexicans, three Dutch citizens, two Germans, two Austrians, a French citizen, an Italian, a Spaniard, a Venezuelan and a Japanese. The seven member crew were all Cuban, as were 33 passengers.

Emergency vehicles lined a road about 2 miles (3 kilometers) from the crash site, and journalists were not permitted to get any closer to the wreckage in a remote and rugged area.

Photos posted on the website of the local newspaper, Escambray, showed a large piece of the plane in flames, with rescue workers in olive-green military uniforms standing around it. Others showed rescue workers using a bulldozer to reach the remote site.

Another picture showed an image of the AeroCaribbean plane in happier times, painted white, yellow and blue, and adorned with images of bending palm trees.

The paper said the local Communist Party chief as well as Interior Ministry and other officials were at the scene helping with the effort.