China Eastern Airlines flight MU5735 crashed en route from Kunming to Guangzhou with 132 souls on board today.
The aircraft is a B737-8 that was first delivered in 2015 and built-in Renton Washington. It is not a 737 MAX aircraft. The flight profile shows an uncontrolled descent from cruise altitude to loss of contact in two minutes.
Footage of the accident flight seems to support some inflight breakup as there are intact pieces of debris circling the main impact area.
However, the main MU5735 crash site shows very little sign of the 737 which impacted the mountains in China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.
Considering that China flies more 737s than every country of Europe combined, it has had a remarkably safe history of operations over the last 20 years. The last major accident was 12 years ago by a regional airline. China Eastern is the second-largest carrier in China and operates flights to 100+ countries in the world.
ALG will be updating this post as more information is obtained about the accident.
中國民航局證實，中國東方航空一架載有132人的波音737客機，周一（21日）在廣西自治區梧州市上空失去聯絡，目前已確認墜毀，引發山火。民航局已啟動應急機制，派出工作組趕赴現場。救援隊伍已經集結，正在靠近，傷亡情況未明。東航官網頁面已換成黑白色。
有目擊者表示，飛機墜毀地點為藤縣埌南莫埌村大唐口組。有參與現場救援的村幹部表示，發生事故的飛機已經完全解體，他在現場未看到遇難者遺體。目擊者指，墜機引發的山火燒毀附近林木，消防員趕到現場後將大部分山火已經撲滅。
內地官媒最初通報，涉事航班搭載133人起飛，民航局其後核實，涉事航班機上有123名旅客和9名機組人員；1人未有登機。實時航班監測網站「flightradar24」顯示，涉事客機一直在大約8,869米高度飛行；至下午2點19分，飛機突然從下降，同時飛行速度從約每小時845公里下降，兩分鐘後客機與地面失聯，相信經已墜毀。涉事客機為波音737-800型號，在周一下午1時30分起飛，由雲南省昆明長水國際機場，飛往廣東省廣州白雲國際機場，原定下午3時05分抵達。該客機註冊號為B1791，機齡6.8年，在2015年6月22日交付中國東方航空雲南有限公司。