A Pakistani jet with 47 people on board has crashed, shortly after losing contact with ground control.
The Pakistan International Airlines ATR-42 aircraft vanished after taking off from the Northern Chitral region, the airline has stated.
The national carrier confirmed in a statement that Flight PK-661, from the city of Chitral to Islamabad, had lost contact with air traffic controllers.
Officials have said it is very unlikely that there will be survivors from the crash.
Airline spokesman Danyal Gilani said 37 of those on board were passengers.
The aircraft was carrying ‘around 40 people’, the airline said in a statement, but the civil aviation authority said 47 people were on board.
It is not yet clear how many casualties there were. The airline said it has mobilised its emergency response centre.
Laiq Shah, a senior police official in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, said the plane crashed in the province’s Havelian area.
‘Rescue teams are reaching the scene of the crash, and then we will know more,’ Civil Aviation Authority spokesman Pervez George told Reuters.
There were no immediate details on casualties, but Pakistan’s interior ministry has dispatched a team with experts on identifying bodies through DNA tests.
State-run Pakistan Television showed a huge fire rising from the site of the crash.
Villagers were seen standing near the site.
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