A passenger plane flying from Azerbaijan’s capital, Baku, to Russia has crashed near the city of Aqtau in western Kazakhstan with 67 people on board, Kazakh authorities said on December 25.
Authorities said that dozens of people had been killed but that there were several survivors.
There have been conflicting reports about the number of survivors of the crash, but Kazakh health officials said that 14 people were admitted to hospital.
“At the moment, 14 survivors have been taken to the regional hospital, including five in intensive care,” the Health Ministry’s regional department said in a statement.
Kazakhstan’s Emergencies Ministry said in a statement that rescue teams were on the site of the crash and fire services had put out the blaze.
Azerbaijan Airlines said the Embraer 190 aircraft, with flight number J2-8243, had been flying from Baku to Grozny, the capital of Chechnya, but was forced to make an emergency landing approximately three kilometers from Aqtau.
The cause of the crash was not immediately known.
The plane had reportedly been rerouted due to fog in Grozny.
The passengers are citizens of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Russia, local news agencies reported.
