A Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) plane flying from Chitral to Islamabad Wednesday crashed on a hilly terrain near Havelian, some 87 kilometres from the capital, killing all the 48 passengers including crew members and singer of popular “Dil Dil Pakistan” Junaid Jamshed who was among those on-board the flight, officials said.
According to Civil Aviation Authority spokesman, the ATR-42 plane with 47 passengers went missing from the radar near Havelian while it was on its way to Islamabad. Initial reports suggest the 10-year-old plane is believed to have crash-landed due to some technical fault.
Reports claimed two Australian and one Chinese engineers were among the passengers.
The plane took off from Chitral around 3:00 p.m. (PST) but it lost communication with the control tower at around 4:30 p.m. shortly before it was about to arrive at its destination.
CAA sources confirmed a mayday call from the pilot to the control tower was received shortly before it lost communication with the plane.
Eyewitnesses said they had seen a plane crash in a hilly area near Havelian, near the Ordinance factory. Clouds of smoke could be seen rising from the area of the reported crash, as also seen in a photo released by the local police.
Ground rescue teams had been sent to the area, sources said. The Inter-Services Public Relations said that army contingents and helicopters have also been dispatched for rescue operations.
Those listed as passengers included singer-turned-preacher, Junaid Jamshed and his wife.
Jamshed, a former musician and an evangelical figure and ‘naat-khwaan,’ was returning from Chitral and was seated 27-C.Jamshed’s brother has confirmed that he was onboard the ill-fated plane.
In 2012, a Bhoja Airline plane, a Boeing 737 carrying 121 passengers and six crew members, crashed near Islamabad just before touchdown.
The worst aviation tragedy on Pakistani soil came in July 2010 when an Airbus 321 passenger jet operated by the private airline Airblue crashed into hills overlooking Islamabad. The flight was coming in from Karachi.
The PIA said an emergency response center has been activated and can be accessed at following phone numbers for updates.
