Reuters
 
Tehran, Sep 2: A plane with 147 people on board skidded off the runway in northeastern Iran on Friday and caught fire, killing as many as 80 people, state television reported.

State TV said earlier that a tire had blown out as the Russian-made Tu-154 was landing in the city of Mashhad. No crew members died in the fire, and the other passengers were evacuated, state TV said.

Dozens of passengers were evacuated, some with minor injuries, state TV said. The fire was under control and investigators were at the scene, the report said.

Despite the state TV report, a spokesman for Iran's Civil Aviation Organisation, Reza Jafarzadeh, told The Associated Press that the death toll and the cause of the incident were not yet clear.

State TV later said that the death toll was between 70 and 80 and that 50-60 passengers were evacuated from the aircraft.

The flight run by Iran Airtour, which is affiliated to Iran's national air carrier, originated in Bandar Abbas in the south of the country.

Some 12 million pilgrims visit Mashhad, about 620 miles northeast of Tehran, annually for its Shiite Islamic shrines.

In December 2005, a military C-130 loaded with Iranian journalists crashed into a 10-story apartment building in a Tehran suburb as the pilot attempted an emergency landing after developing engine trouble, killing 115 people - 94 in the plane and 21 on the ground.

In April 2005, an Iranian military Boeing 707 with 157 people aboard skidded off a runway at Tehran airport and caught fire, killing three people. In 2003, a Russian-made Il-76 carrying members of the elite Revolutionary Guards crashed in the mountains of southeastern Iran, killing 302 people.

In 2002, a Ukrainian-built aircraft carrying aerospace scientists crashed in central Iran, killing all 44 people aboard.