State TV: 168 killed when Iranian plane headed to Armenia crashes

State TV: 168 killed in Iran plane crash

TEHRAN, Iran — State TV says 168 people were killed when a passenger plane crashed Wednesday in northwest Iran.

Iranian Civil Aviation Organization spokesman Reza Jafarzadeh had told state television that 153 passengers and 15 crewmembers were on the Russian-made Caspian Airlines jet that had been headed from Tehran to the Armenian capital yerevan.

Footage from the scene on state-run Press TV shows a deep trench smashed into an agricultural field by the impact, littered with smoking wreckage. It showed a large chunk of a wing, but much of the wreckage appeared to be in small pieces.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — A passenger plane carrying 150 people crashed Wednesday in northwest Iran, and all on board were feared dead, state media reported.

The Caspian Airlines jet was heading from Tehran to the Armenian capital Yerevan when it crashed near the village of Jannatabad outside the city of Qazvin, around 75 miles northwest of Tehran, state television said.

The Qazvin emergency services director Hossein Bahzadpour tells the IRNA news agency that the plane was completely destroyed and shattered to pieces, and the wreckage was in flames. “It his highly likely that all the passengers on the flight were killed,” Bahzadpour said. He did not give a number, but state TV said 150 were on the flight.

Caspian Airlines is a Russian-Iranian joint venture founded in 1993. Iran has frequent plane crashes, which it blames on U.S. sanctions on the country that prevent it from getting spare parts for aging airplanes. Caspian Airlines, however, uses Russian-made aircraft whose maintenance would be less impaired by American sanctions.