Jetliner In Mexico Crashes, Catches Fire, But All 103 Aboard Escape

By Scott Neuman

Published August 1, 2018 at 2:22 AM CDT

Red Cross workers and rescue workers carry an injured person on a stretcher as airline workers walk away from the site where an Aeromexico airliner crashed in a field near the airport in Durango, Mexico, on Tuesday.

A jetliner crashed in bad weather shortly after takeoff from the western Mexican city of Durango, skidding to a halt in a nearby field. However, all 103 passengers and crew managed a miraculous escape before flames consumed the plane.

Officials said 85 of the survivors who got out of the burning Aeromexico Embraer E190 suffered injuries in the crash. The Associated Press, citing a Durango state Health Ministry spokesman, said 49 people were hospitalized, most with minor injuries. "The pilot suffered the most serious injury, a cervical lesion that required surgery. Some people had burns on a quarter of their bodies," the AP said.

Mexico Plane Crash: The #Aeromexico flight involved is being reported as #AM2431, due to operate a flight between Durango and Mexico City.

• Aircraft was an Embraer E190 aircraft — which is a short range airliner, 11 Business Class seats and 88 Economy Class Seats

[enelaire] pic.twitter.com/fvwe7j6igc
— Alex Macheras (@AlexInAir) July 31, 2018

Shaken passengers expressed gratitude for being alive.

"It was really, really ugly," Lorenzo Nunez, a passenger from Chicago who fled the plane with his two sons and wife told reporters, according to the AP.

"We felt the flames coming quickly ... there was a lot of smoke," Jaquelin Flores told the newspaper El Sol.

Flight AM2431 took off in a heavy hailstorm from Guadalupe Victoria International Airport bound for Mexico City. The airport operator, Grupo Aeroportuario Centro Norte, said initial indications are that the weather was the cause of the crash, according to the BBC.

Durango state Gov. Jose Aispuro said passengers reported a loud bang as the plane's left wing hit the ground and the engines tore loose. The accident occurred at about 4 p.m. local time. He said it was too soon to speculate on the cause of the crash.

"Many managed to leave the plane on foot," Civil defense spokesperson Alejandro Cardoza was quoted by the BBC as saying.

He said the fire that started after the crash was put out.