An Azerbaijan Il-76 cargo plane crashed near a farm in Northwest China yesterday, killing all seven crew members.

The four-engine heavy transport plane went down about 10 kilometres from the Urumqi International Airport located in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

Much of the aircraft burnt at the accident site.

Charred bodies of the crew members - including 6 Ukrainians and an Azerbaijianian - were discovered by emergency workers at the site.

Nobody on the ground was hurt in the accident, even though the shattered plane and cargo it carried were scattered along a 2-square kilometre area, police officials said.

The plane was operating on a chartered flight mission from Taiyuan, capital of North China's Shanxi Province, to Baku in Azerbaijan via Urumqi.

It took off from Taiyuan Airport at 5:50 am, landed at Urumqi Airport at 9:10 am and crashed into the Sanping Farm at 10:50, just 2 minutes after it took off, said Yang Yong, deputy director of the airport's publicity department.

Nearly 1,000 police officers, armed police and civilians took part in a vain search for dead crew members, Yang told China Daily yesterday.

The accident occurred when the nose of the cargo plane first touched down the earth, causing explosions and sending off dense smoke, eyewitnesses said.

(HK Edition 05/19/2004 page1)