15 killed in a military cargo plane crash in Iran

A military cargo plane crashed in bad weather on Monday west of the Iranian capital, killing 15 out of the 16 people on board, the Iranian army said.

"The plane was a cargo Boeing 707 that overshot the runway during its landing," Iran's aviation organization spokesman Reza Jafarzadeh told state broadcaster IRIB.

A flight engineer survived and was taken to the hospital, the army said in a statement carried by the semi-official Fars news agency.

The plane crashed at Fath Airport when it was meant to land at the nearby Payam International Airport, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) west of Tehran, the Iranian capital.

“A Boeing cargo 707 places carrying meat from Bishkek in Kyrgyzstan had an emergency landing at Fath airport today ... the flight engineer has been dispatched to the hospital,” the army said.

Fire immediately engulfed the aircraft after it skidded off a runway and crashed into a wall separating the airfield from a residential neighborhood.

The army’s statement came after some confusion over who owned the plane. Earlier on Monday, a spokesman for Iran’s civil aviation told had told state TV that the plane belonged to Kyrgyzstan, while a spokeswoman for Kyrgyzstan’s Manas airport said the plane belonged to Iran’s Payam Air.

State TV said rescue teams had been sent to the area, between the airports of Fath and Payam. It showed footage of burning wreckage of the plane and a plume of smoke rising from the crash site.

Authorities did not immediately offer a reason for the crew's mistake. Fath Airport belongs to Iran's powerful paramilitary Revolutionary Guard. Earlier, Iranian state media said 10 people were on board of the crashed plane.