A China Northern Airlines plane plunged into the sea off the northeast coastal city of Dalian Tuesday night after its crew reported a fire in the cabin, and all 112 aboard were feared dead.

Chinese warships and tugs combed the dark waters overnight, recovering 60 bodies, but hopes of finding survivors were dim, rescue workers and state media said on Wednesday.

The twin-engined McDonnell-Douglas MD-82 crashed about six miles off the coast at around 9:40 pm as it was coming in to land Tuesday, minutes after the captain reported the fire, Xinhua News Agency said.

The aircraft made several circles before suddenly plunging into the sea with its lights out, Xinhua quoted Dalian port worker Liu Jiqing as saying.

Another worker at Dalian port said he was surprised by the noise of the impact. "Ambulances and police poured in and I knew it was a crash," he said.

"The rescue workers found a pushcart used for serving food that has been burned black and (broken) in half, which indicates the seriousness of the fire," Xinhua said.

Xinhua said there was little hope of finding anyone who survived the crash -- China's second in a month.

On April 15, an Air China Boeing 767 crashed into a South Korean mountain in thick fog on route from Beijing to Pusan, killing 122 in the airline's first crash.

Thirty-eight people survived and six are unaccounted for.

Navy Joins Search

The China Northern crash brought a grim end to the week-long Labor Day holidays, during which millions of domestic travelers toured the country and airlines laid on extra flights.

A rescue official said from Dalian a flotilla of more than 30 tugs was combing the sea for possible survivors and picking up pieces of wreckage.

"It looks unlikely that we will have any survivors," a rescue official at Dalian port said.

The aircraft was carrying 103 passengers and nine crew. Eight foreigners -- including two from Japan and two from South Korea -- were on board.

President Jiang Zemin and Premier Zhu Rongji ordered aviation, police and transport agencies and the military to "fully organize and support rescue efforts."

At Beijing's Capital Airport, China Northern Airline workers were seen reviewing tickets and passenger lists to identify those on board the plane, but they declined to comment.

Most of the passengers were from the Yellow Sea city of Dalian. Family members gathered in city hotels to await word on the fate of their relatives.

Police had begun DNA testing to identify victims of the disaster and a State Council, or cabinet, investigation team landed in Dalian early Wednesday.

Ground controllers lost contact with the plane at 9:32 pm after its captain reported the fire in the cabin and the aircraft crashed eight minutes later, it said.

The flight left Beijing at 8:37 pm and was due to land at Dalian's Zhoushuizi Airport about an hour later.

Chris Yates, air safety expert with aviation and defense publishers Jane's, said there were many potential causes for fire in aircraft, including smoking and faulty electrical wiring.

"I imagine that investigators will consider a particular type of electrical cabling that might have overheated and caused the fire in the Chinese plane," he said.

Second Crash

It was the second deadly crash for the Shenyang-based airline, which according to China Northern's Website had 24 MD-82s in its fleet of more than 80 aircraft.

In November 1993, an MD-82 operated by China Northern crashed while landing in the northwestern city of Urumuqi, killing 12 and injuring seven.

The plane that crashed Tuesday was delivered in July 1991 and had logged 26,000 flight hours on 16,000 flights, according to Boeing.

It was one of 35 MD-80 series jets assembled from McDonnell Douglas parts kits at a Shanghai factory. Thirty of those went to Chinese carriers and five were shipped back to US carrier TWA.

China's worst crash occurred in June 1994 when a Russian-built Tupolev-154 operated by China Northwest Airlines en route from the tourist city of Xi'an to Guangzhou crashed less than 10 minutes after take-off, killing all 160 people on board.

(China Daily May 8, 2002)