At least ten people were injured when a Boeing took off from Dakar. The plane left the runway and caught fire. Details about the causes are not yet known.
A Boeing 737 chartered by the Senegalese airline Air Senegal veered off the runway during takeoff from Dakar International Airport.
At least ten people were injured in the accident in the capital of the West African state of Senegal, four of them seriously, according to the Senegalese Ministry of Transport. Accordingly, one of the pilots is among the injured.
Photos show burning plane
Footage from a passenger shows part of the plane in flames. “Our plane just caught fire,” Malian musician Cheick Siriman Sissoko wrote on Facebook. His post shows a picture of passengers exiting a burning plane via an emergency slide.
The injured were taken to a hospital and the remaining passengers and crew members were taken to a hotel, according to the Ministry of Transport. It announced an investigation into the incident. Further details, such as the causes, are not yet known.
The airport was closed for several hours. Flight operations resumed in the morning.
79 passengers and six crew members on board
According to the information, the Boeing 737 was on its way to Bamako, the capital of Mali, with 79 passengers and six crew members.
The Aviation Safety Network, which documents aviation accidents, released photos of the damaged plane in a grassy field surrounded by firefighting foam on Platform X. One engine appeared to have broken apart and a wing was also damaged. The ASN is part of the Flight Safety Foundation, a nonprofit organization committed to aviation safety.