46 injured as plane catches fire

Iranian officials told local news networks that the rear end of the Russian-built Tupolev 154 plane owned by Taban Airline caught fire as the aircraft was landing at Mashhad airport.

“The plane caught fire while landing,” state television quoted Javad Erfanian, head of disaster management of Khorasan Razavi province of which Mashhad is the capital, as saying.

“Forty-six people have been injured, but most of them are not serious,” he said, adding that emergency services evacuated the passengers after which the rear end of the aircraft broke up. The English language state-owned Press TV said the plane, travelling from Abadan in southwest Iran to Mashhad, had 157 passengers on board. Erfanian said the plane also had 13 crew members on board.
Reza Jafarzadeh, spokesman for Iranian civil aviation, said the plane had left Abadan on Saturday, but bad weather in Mashhad led to the aircraft landing in the central city of Isfahan for the night before it took off again for Mashhad early Sunday.