Turkish Red Crescent confirms 11 dead after plane crash in Iran

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan 24) – All 11 people on board of a private Turkish plane were killed after it crashed in southeastern Iran, a Turkish Red Crescent official confirmed on Sunday.

Kerem Kinik, the head of the Turkish Red Crescent, confirmed the deaths after seven local Red Crescent search and rescue teams had been dispatched to the site to retrieve the bodies and help possible survivors.

The identities of the victims have not been released although some media outlets reported the plane, a Canadian-made Bombardier Challenger 600 aircraft, belonged to a company named Basaran Holding.

One of the alleged victims is thought to be Mina Basaran, a 28-year-old woman part of Basaran Holding’s board of managers who was next in line to lead the business, the Associated Press said. Basaran was returning from a bachelorette party in Dubai with seven of her friends.

A civil aviation spokesperson had earlier said eight passengers and three crew members were on board the plane which had caught fire.

“The plane is on fire. After the pilot asked to lower altitude, it disappeared from the radar,” Iranian state news agency ISNA quoted Reza Jafarzadeh, head of the Iran Civil Aviation Organization.

The cause of the crash has not been confirmed, but local media reported villagers near the incident saying they saw flames emerging from the plane’s engine before the aircraft went down.

In February, an Iranian ATR-72, a twin-engine turboprop used for short-distance regional flying, crashed in southern Iran, killing all 65 passengers on board.

The plane was flying from Tehran to the southern city of Yasuj in Isfahan Province when it crashed near the Zagros mountains.