Death toll in Louisville UPS plane crash rises to 9
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Smoke rising from the wreckage of a UPS MD-11 cargo jet after it crashed on departure from Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport in Louisville, Kentucky, on Nov 4.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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- A UPS cargo plane crashed in Louisville, Kentucky, on November 4, resulting in nine confirmed fatalities, according to Mayor Craig Greenberg.
- The NTSB is investigating the crash, focusing on a possible engine failure, with the flight data and cockpit voice recorders crucial to the investigation.
- The Louisville airport reopened, but UPS cancelled sorting shifts and the runway where the accident occurred will be closed for 10 days.
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LOUISVILLE, Kentucky - The death toll from the crash of a UPS cargo plane that erupted into a fireball moments after takeoff in Louisville, Kentucky on Nov 4 has risen to nine, city and state officials said on Nov 5.
Investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board will be on site later on the morning of Nov 5 to begin the process of finding out what went wrong when the 34-year-old MD-11 cargo plane caught fire around 5.13pm ET on Nov 4 and then crashed.
Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg said nine dead people had been found at the scene of the crash.
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear said on social media it was possible there would be more fatalities.
The plane had a crew of three according to UPS and officials said none of the crew survived.
Several buildings in an industrial area beyond the runway were on fire after the crash, with thick, black smoke seen rising into the evening sky.
Officials said 11 victims had been taken to hospitals on Nov 4. A government official told Reuters at least 10 others remain unaccounted for.
Mr Beshear told CNN that two people remain in critical condition and added it could have been much worse.
“This plane barely missed a restaurant bar. It was very close to a very large Ford plant with hundreds, if not a thousand plus workers,” Mr Beshear said. “It was very close to our convention centre that’s having a big livestock show that people were arriving for.”
The international airport in Louisville reopened to air traffic early on Nov 5, though the runway where the accident happened is expected to remain closed for another 10 days, officials said.
UPS said on Nov 5 it cancelled a parcel sorting shift that usually begins in the mid-morning at its facility at the airport after it had halted package sorting operations on Nov 4.
US aviation safety expert Anthony Brickhouse said on Nov 5 he has not seen any evidence of a link between the accident and a 36-day US government shutdown that has strained air traffic control.
NTSB investigators will be looking to retrieve the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder that will shed light on the crash.
Mr Brickhouse said investigators are expected to focus on the number one engine which was seen on video to be ignited, and appeared to have separated from the aircraft.
“It is designed to fly if you lose one engine, but we need to see the effect of losing that engine on the rest of the aircraft,” Mr Brickhouse said.
The triple-engine plane was fuelled for an eight-and-a-half-hour flight to Honolulu.
It was the first UPS cargo plane to crash since August 2013, when an Airbus aircraft went down on a landing approach to the international airport in Birmingham, Alabama, killing both crew. REUTERS
