At least 170 people died when a passenger jet crashed near Tehran.
A Ukrainian Boeing 737-800 carrying at least 170 people crashed on Wednesday shortly after takeoff from Tehran, killing everyone aboard, according to the Iranian state news media.
The circumstances of the crash were unclear. The Iranian outlets cited technical problems with the plane, which was bound for Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital. The crash came at a tense time in Iran, as conflict with the United States had the country on edge.
Photographs
posted by Iranian news organizations showed rescuers examining smoking
rubble in a field. The state-run Iranian Students’ News Agency shared a video
it said showed the predawn crash, with a distant light descending in
the distance before a bright burst filled the sky upon impact.
The
plane, Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752, departed Imam
Khomeini International Airport, which serves Tehran, at 6:12 a.m. on
Wednesday and lost contact at 6:14 a.m., according to a flight tracker.
“We are aware of the media reports out of Iran and we are gathering more information,” Boeing said in a statement.
Boeing has been under intense scrutiny after the crash of two 737 Max jets
in less than five months, which together killed 346 people. The Max has
been grounded worldwide since March, creating a crisis for the company
and leading to the firing of the chief executive.
The
crash on Wednesday could also touch a nerve politically in Ukraine as
the airline operating the flight, Ukraine International Airlines, is
partly owned through a network of offshore companies by Ihor Kolomoisky, an oligarch with close ties to President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The
Ukrainian president expressed his condolences to the relatives and
friends of the passengers and crew. Vadym Prystaiko, Ukraine’s foreign
minister, said the victims included 82 Iranians and 11 Ukrainians,
including nine Ukrainian crew members. Sixty-three passengers were from
Canada, 10 from Sweden, four from Afghanistan, three from Britain and
three from Germany, he said.
A
number of international airlines announced that flights would be
avoiding the airspace over Iran and Iraq after reports of strikes on
bases housing American troops in Iraq. The moves also came after the
apparently unrelated news of the crash of a Ukrainian passenger plane in the early hours of Wednesday near Tehran. Other airlines have canceled flights to the region.
On
Tuesday, the F.A.A. barred American airliners from flying over Iran,
citing the risk of commercial planes being mistaken for military
aircraft.
The Dutch airline KLM said on Wednesday that it was no longer flying in Iraqi or Iranian airspace “until further notice,” citing security risks. Air France and the Australian carrier Qantas took similar measures, news agencies reported.
The
German carrier Lufthansa also announced the temporary cancellation of a
daily flight between Frankfurt and Tehran because of the security
situation, according to Reuters, but later said it would restart that
route on Thursday.
