Plane catches fire at Tehran airport

A passenger plane caught fire while taxiing at Tehran airport tonight, injuring scores of passengers.

Initial reports of 50 people killed were not yet confirmed.

The left engine of the plane caught fire while taxiing on the runway at Tehran’s Mehrabad airport.

The Saha Airlines plane then plunged into a river at the end of the runway.

“No deaths have been confirmed by the officials,” local television said, backing off from its earlier report that 50 passengers had been killed.

The plane, carrying 157 passengers, eight of them children, had just arrived from the tourist island of Kish in the Persian Gulf.