Plane crashes in Russia, scores feared dead

MOSCOW, July 9 (Reuters) A Russian passenger plane carrying 200 people, many of them holidaymakers, crashed during a domestic flight to Siberia today, killing most of those on board, news agencies said.

The Airbus A-310 crashed and exploded into flames after landing in the city of Irkutsk following a 5,000 km night flight from Moscow, emergency services said.

A total of 192 passengers and eight crew were on board flight number 778 when it overshot the runway on landing in Irkutsk, and slammed into a concrete wall and buildings nearby at 0250 Moscow time.

''Fifty-five of those on board have been taken to hospital. Up to now, 65 bodies have been recovered,'' a spokeswoman for Russia's emergencies ministry told Reuters.

Earlier, Interfax news agency quoted a source at the prosecutor's office in Irkutsk as saying only 43 people had been taken to hospital and the rest had perished.

The dead included the eight-member crew, Interfax said.

Many of those on board were holidaymakers bound for a vacation on Lake Baikal, a popular Siberian spot in summer, Itar-Tass news agency said.

Television pictures from the scene showed the smoking ruins of the Airbus, which ploughed into garage buildings adjacent to the runway. Only the plane's tail section was left intact.

Around 600 rescue workers were at the scene. Rescue teams, working in rainy weather and poor visibility, used cutting equipment to recover bodies from the smouldering wreckage.

''We can confirm that the plane crashed on landing and caught fire,'' a spokesman for Sibir, the company that operated the plane, told Reuters. ''We don't have any information on the cause of the accident or the number of victims.'' Last May an Airbus A-320 of the Armenian airline Armavia, with 113 passengers and crew flying from Yerevan to the Russian seaside resort Sochi, crashed in the Black Sea while trying to land in bad weather. Everyone on board was killed.

Reuters SHB GC1038