Ukraine Boeing 737 Crash, Fire struck one of its engines just after takeoff.
A Ukrainian airliner crashed soon after taking off from Tehran’s Imam Khomeini airport on Wednesday (Jan 8), killing all 176 people aboard.
Ukraine’s foreign ministry confirmed that everyone aboard the Boeing 737-800 flown by Ukraine International Airlines was killed after it came down shortly after it departed from Imam Khomeini International Airport in the Iranian capital of Tehran.
There were three British people on board, as well as citizens from six other countries, according to the Ukraine’s Minister for Foreign Affairs Vadym Prystaiko.
Asked at a briefing in Kyiv if the plane could have been downed by a missile, Ukraine’s Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk refused to rule it out, but cautioned against speculation until the investigation concluded.
Initially, Ukraine’s embassy in Iran said on Wednesday morning that engine failure caused the plane to crash and denied that it was terror-related or that a rocket had hit the aircraft.
But it later withdrew this statement, saying that anything was possible, and Mr Zelensky instructed Ukraine’s prosecutors to open criminal proceedings over the crash.
Video footage by Iran’s ISNA news agency purports to show the plane on fire in the seconds before it crashes into the ground, which is corroborated by Qassem Biniaz, a spokesman for Iran’s Road and Transportation Ministry, who said it appeared a fire struck one of its engines.
