Twenty-four of the 31 people killed in Wednesday's TransAsia Airways plane crash in Taiwan have so far been identified, officials said Thursday.
Flight GE235, en route to Kinmen from Taipei with 53 passengers on board, crashed in the Keelung river Wednesday after its wing clipped a taxi on an elevated freeway 10 minutes after takeoff, Xinhua reported.
According to official reports, 31 people have been confirmed killed, 15 injured and 12 others missing.
Besides those on the crashed ATR-72 aircraft, a driver and a passenger in the taxi clipped by the plane before it plunged into the river were also injured.
The dead include 16 passengers from China, five Taiwanese passengers and the captain and two co-pilots.
Rafts and helicopters are scouring the crash site, and along the Keelung river as well as its banks.
The cockpit and tail of the plane have been hoisted out of the water, while some segments of the fuselage remain submerged.
The Taiwan Aviation Safety Council said that it has invited accident investigators from the Chinese mainland to take part in the accident investigation.
Investigators from France, manufacturers of the aircraft, and from Canada, the engine manufacturers, have also been invited.
TransAsia has also decided to hand out compensation of 200,000 new Taiwan dollars (about $6,356) to each injured victim, including the two in the taxi, and compensation of 1.2 million new Taiwan dollars to the families of each identified fatality.
Since the crash, Taiwan's civil aeronautics authority has conducted safety checks on power systems of the island's ATR-72 aircrafts.
According to the authority, TransAsia had already completed two flights using ATR-72 aircraft Wednesday before the crash, with flight and maintenance reports of these flights featuring no record of malfunction.
Dispatchers on duty denied the possibility of a rushed takeoff when interviewed by investigators.
Taipei Songshan Airport cancelled 11 local flights, which were all due to be served by ATR-72 aircraft, according to the airport's website.
According to Taipei authorities, the crashed plane had been in service since April 2014 and was subject to a routine safety check last month.
This is not the first time that an ATR-72 aircraft has crashed in Taiwan. On July 23, 2014, TransAsia Airways flight GE222 crashed on Taiwan's Penghu Island, killing 48 people.
TransAsia Airways, founded in 1951, was Taiwan's first private airline, mainly focusing on short overseas flights.
