No evidence of terrorism in Chinese plane crash

An airliner that crashed in northern China exploded seconds after take-off and “broke into flaming fragments” before plunging into an ice-covered lake, killing 54 people, but investigators found no evidence of terrorism, reports said today.

Divers searched the lake for the “black box” flight data recorders of the Bombardier CRJ-200 belonging to China Eastern Airlines, which went down yesterday after taking off from the northern city of Baotou on a flight to Shanghai.