Fire engulfs plane after crash landing

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- An Indonesian jetliner carrying 140 people burst into flames as it landed on Java island today, trapping people inside the burning plane, the airline and witnesses said.

Australian Prime Minister John Howard said that Indonesian officials had confirmed 49 deaths and that some Australians may be among them.

"It is a terrible tragedy," Howard said at a nationally televised news conference.

The Garuda airlines jet shook violently as it prepared to land and then overshot the runway at Yogyakarta airport, striking fences and slamming into a rice field around 7 a.m., survivors said.

Some passengers escaped and rescuers tried to reach those trapped on the Boeing 737-400, said Captain Ari Sapari, operations director of national carrier Garuda.

Among the passengers were Australian journalists and diplomatic staff who were in Indonesia in connection with a visit by Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, said Australian Treasurer Peter Costello in Canberra. The foreign minister was not on the plane; the fate of the Australians was unknown.

Metro TV reported that a nearby hospital was treating around 60 injured.

There was no immediate word on what sparked the blaze. Survivors said it began at the front the plane.

"Before the plane landed it was shaking. Suddenly there was smoke inside the fuselage, it hit the runway and then it landed in a rice field," local Islamic leader Dien Syamsudin told El-Shinta. "I saw a foreigner. His clothes were on fire and I jumped from the emergency exit. Thank God I survived."

BBC World television carried footage of raging flames poking through several windows of the passenger compartment.

Indonesia has recently been hit by a string of transportation disasters. In late December, a passenger ferry sank in a storm in the Java Sea, killing about 400 people. Days later, a passenger plane operated by the budget airline Adam Air crashed into the ocean, killing all 102 people on board.