Rediff

Sep 16: Eighty people were killed, most of them foreigners, when a Thai airliner carrying 123 passengers crashed on landing at Thailand's tourist island of Phuket on Sunday afternoon.

It is not known whether any Indian tourists were on the plane.

The plane, belonging to the budget airline One-Two-Go burst into flames and broke in two when it tried to land in heavy rain, Thai officials said.

The plane was carrying 123 passengers and five crew members on a domestic flight from Bangkok to Phuket, Thai television station TITV said.

Several people have been hospitalised and some passengers were missing, officials said adding, several of the dead were tourists.

Phuket's Deputy Governor Worapot Ratthaseema said the bodies were laid out in the airport building.

The dead included Irish, Israeli, Australian and British passengers. The injured also included foreigners.

An Irish survivor told a local Thai TV station that he felt that even when the plane was landing it was in trouble.

"The visibility was poor as the pilot attempted to land. He decided to make a go-around, but the plane lost balance and crashed," local media in Bangkok said quoting sources.

One-Two-Go is owned by Orient Thai Airways.

The worst crash in Thailand so far has been the 1998 crash when 101 people were killed after a Thai Airways crashed while trying to land in heavy rain at Surat Thani near Bangkok.