Louisville, Kentucky– At least seven people were killed after a UPS cargo plane crashed Tuesday while taking off from a Louisville airport, leaving a trail of flames just miles from downtown.
The plane crashed at approximately 5:15 pm after its left wing caught fire. The 1991 McDonnell Douglas MD-11 was departing for Honolulu from the UPS Worldport at Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport.
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear said 11 others were injured “very seriously.”
The victims have not been publicly identified. Louisville Fire Chief Brian O’Neill said four of the dead were not on board the plane.
Here’s what’s known about the fatal accident.
A video clip showed flames on the plane’s left wing and a trail of smoke. The plane then rose slightly off the ground before crashing and exploding in a huge fireball. Residents, who took out their phones when they heard loud explosions, captured several balls of flame exploding in the sky in succession. The video also revealed parts of the torn roof of the building next to the end of the runway.
The fire spread to “almost an entire apartment building,” O’Neill said.
The Louisville Airport was closed after the incident and was not expected to resume operations as of Wednesday morning.
Louisville is home to UPS’ largest package processing facility. The center employs thousands of workers, has 300 daily flights and sorts more than 400,000 packages per hour.
UPS acknowledged the incident in a brief statement and said the National Transportation Safety Board would investigate. The company said it halted package sorting operations Tuesday night at the Louisville facility and did not specify when it would resume operations.
Officials said there were no dangerous goods on board.
Based on the videos, it appears the plane was struggling to gain altitude while its left side caught fire around one of its engines, aviation lawyer Pablo Rojas said. Due to the large amount of fuel the plane was carrying, once the fire broke out in that area, it was only a matter of time before an explosion occurred or the fire grew significantly.
“There was very little to contain the fire, and the plane itself was almost a bomb because of the amount of fuel,” he added.
He added that it is difficult to know whether the pilot noticed the fire from inside the plane. Even if the pilot had realized there was a problem when they were about to take off, Rojas said stopping at that point might have been the riskier option.