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Azerbaijan airlines suspends flights
(AP)
Updated: 2005-12-27 09:19

Azerbaijan's national airline has suspended flights by its one remaining Ukrainian-built plane and put off plans to acquire two more after a crash of the model killed 23 people, officials said Monday.

All 18 passengers and five crew were killed when an Azerbaijani Airlines An-140 plunged onto the Caspian Sea shore about 20 miles north of the Azerbaijani capital, Baku, shortly after takeoff late Friday. The plane was en route to Aktau, a city on Kazakhstan's Caspian Sea coast.

Ilham Amirov, the lead investigator into the crash, said Saturday that officials were looking at a control system failure as the most probable cause of the crash. But he added that it was too early to dismiss other possible causes, including terrorism.

Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev (R) attends a scene of Antonov An-140 plane crash at seashore at Nardaran, on the outskirts of Baku, December 24, 2005.
Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev (R) attends a scene of Antonov An-140 plane crash at seashore at Nardaran, on the outskirts of Baku, December 24, 2005.[Reuters]
Azerbaijani Airlines "has one An-140 still left and it was immediately taken out of service following this tragic event until the reasons for the accident have been established," said a senior manager at the airline, Faramakh Mahmudov.

Azerbaijan has also decided to hold off on plans to acquire two more An-140s that it has purchased from Ukraine, said Rauf Jafaradze, the airline's deputy chief.

Azerbaijan was the first foreign commercial customer for the An-140, a twin-engine turboprop designed by Ukraine's Antonov company. The plane, which is capable of carrying about 50 passengers on medium-range flights, has seen a long and difficult development amid severe funding problems that crippled Ukraine's aviation industry after the 1991 Soviet collapse.

A plane of the same make crashed in Iran in December 2002, killing all 44 people on board.

Also Monday, the office of Azerbaijan's chief prosecutor said it has opened a criminal investigation into possible violations of safety measures or flight rules.

Such a measure is common after crashes in the former Soviet Union, and the statement did not indicate whether any specific violations were suspected or who might be to blame.

Local television stations reported the wreckage was spread over a space of about a mile, a pattern that could indicate an explosion.

The plane's black boxes, recovered Sunday, will be sent to Russia or Ukraine for analysis, Amirov said.

The victims included many foreigners �� a Briton, an Australian, a Turk, a Georgian and four citizens of Kazakhstan. Azerbaijan's booming oil sector has brought in many Western firms such as British Petroleum.



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