Saturday, April 10, 2010

Crash kills scores, Poland’s president

SMOLENSK, Russia - Polish President Lech Kaczynski and his wife died Saturday along with about 130 other passengers when their plane crashed while coming in for a landing in western Russia, officials said.

The governor of the Smolensk region, where the crash took place about 11 a.m. (3 a.m. ET), said no one survived.

"The Polish presidential plane did not make it to the runway while landing. Tentative findings indicate that it hit the treetops and fell apart," Sergei Anufriev said on state news channel Rossiya-24. "Nobody has survived the disaster."

The Polish foreign ministry confirmed that Kaczynski and his wife were aboard the plane.

The head of Russia's top investigative body, Sergei Markin, said there were a total of 132 people on the plane, a Tu-154.

A Polish government official said the head of the Polish army and the head of the presidential administration were also on board the plane, along with families of other senior officials.

"The plane caught fire after the crash. Teams began attempting to pull out passengers from the badly damaged airplane," said a Polish Foreign Ministry spokesman in Warsaw.

Editor's note: Please check back for details on this breaking news story.

Source: msnbc.msn.com/

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