Pakistani plane crashes, 152 dead

ISLAMABAD — A Pakistani airliner carrying 152 people crashed in a ball of flames on Wednesday into densely wooded hills outside Islamabad amid heavy rain and poor visibility, killing everyone on board.Thick smoke and flames shot into the sky above the smouldering wreckage, partially buried on a remote hillside alongside pieces of charred flesh and body parts in the worst crash involving a Pakistani passenger jet in 18 years.Commercial company Airblue's flight ED 202 from Karachi was being diverted into land at Islamabad's Benazir Bhutto International airport when witnesses saw it flying at an unusually low altitude before a defeaning boom.The plane disintegrated into a gorge between two hills, enveloped in cloud and some distance from the road, severely hampering rescue efforts and limiting visibility for helicopters hovering overhead, an AFP correspondent said."I saw a big ball of smoke and fire everywhere with big pieces of aircraft rolling down the hill," police official Haji Taj Gul said."The plane was flying very low. Then we heard a loud noise," said Wajih-ur Rehman, a resident of the exclusive E-7 neighbourhood in the Margalla foothills, home to Western expatriates and some of Pakistan's elite. "Nobody survived," Interior Minister Rehman Malik told Express TV. Health officials said DNA tests would be the only way to identify many of the remains.The civil aviation authority and Airblue said there were 152 people, including six crew, on board the doomed plane. Seven children, including two babies, were on the passenger manifest, an official said."It's a big tragedy. It's really a big tragedy," Malik said. The US embassy said two Americans were on the flight. The Austrian government said an Austrian-born businessman was on board as well. Officials suggested the flight had been diverted due to bad weather, but it was unclear why the jet was flying so low and close to the Margalla Hills -- off the normal route for aircraft arriving from the southern city of Karachi.One pilot said that a Pakistan Interna

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