China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737-89P plane crash
Tengxian, China
Updated on
The Boeing 737-800 operated by China Eastern Airlines took off from Kunming, China, for a passenger flight to Guangzhou, China. 123 passengers and 9 crewmembers were on board. The plane was en-route, flying at 29,000 ft (8900 meters) when it suddenly lost altitude and crashed in a wooded mountainous terrain. All the 132 people onboard were killed.
The crash site is located 120 NM (220 km) west of Guangzhou, in Teng County. The aircraft impacted the ground at high speed and in a very steep angle. A part of the Boeing 737 fell onto one side of a hill and the other part onto the other side. The main debris are within 30 meters radius. The aircraft has been pulverized.
A trailing edge of a winglet (1.3 meters by 10 centimeters) from the aircraft was found in farmland about 8 NM (14 km) west of the crash site. Another piece of debris was found about 1.2 NM (2.3 km) north the trailing edge debris. This indicates that these parts separated from the aircraft in flight. No trace of common explosives have been discovered on teh debris. Both black boxes (Flight Data Recorder and Cockpit Voice Recorder) have been recovered.
The aircraft was 7 years old. It had accumulated 18,239 flight hours in 8,986 flight cycles.
