Airbus A320: popular short-haul plane with 11 fatal accidents

PARIS (AFP) - The German airliner that crashed on Tuesday in the French Alps is an Airbus A320, a popular short-to-medium haul model that has been hit by 11 fatal accidents since coming into service in 1988.

The launch of the single-aisle plane made by European aerospace giant Airbus was controversial as its computerised flight control system reduced the number of pilots required on board to two from three.

Airbus has won thousands of orders for the model, with nearly 6,200 aircraft from the A320 family currently in service worldwide.

Here is a list of deadly crashes involving the A320:

June 1988:

Air France plane went down at the airport in eastern France's Mulhouse-Habsheim, at an air show. Three killed.

February 1990:

Indian Airlines plane crashed on landing in Bangalore, southern India. Ninety-two people killed.

January 1992:

French company Air Inter's airliner crashed in eastern France not far from the city of Strasbourg. Eighty-seven dead, nine survived.

September 1993:

German carrier Lufthansa's plane caught fire on landing near Warsaw. Two dead and 54 injured.

August 2000:

Gulf Air plane crashed into the sea off Bahrain. 143 people dead.

May 2006:

Armavia plane crashed into the Black Sea. 113 people dead.

July 2007:

Tam Airlines of Brazil careered off the runway upon landing at the Sao Paulo airport, then slammed into a warehouse. 199 people dead.

November 2008:

Air New Zealand plane plunged into the sea off France's Mediterranean coast during a test flight. Seven dead.

July 2010:

Pakistan's Airblue airliner crashed in the hills close to Islamabad due to poor visibility. 152 dead.

December 2014:

An AirAsia plane crashed into the Java Sea. 162 dead.

March 2015:

Germanwings plane crashed into the southern French Alps. All 150 people on board feared dead.

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