Five die in Rhode Island plane crash
     LINCOLN, R.I. (September 6, 1997 11:39 p.m. EDT) -- A single-
 engine plane carrying skydivers crashed during takeoff, killing five
 people and critically injuring one other Saturday.
     The Cessna Skylane Model 182 reached about 200 feet off the
 ground before it tilted left about 90 degrees and crashed into trees
 by the runway, said John Roan, a flight instructor at the North
 Central State Airport.
     "The engine was full throttle, then all of a sudden I didn't
 hear anything. The engine just quit. It died," said Chris Rossi, an
 airport maintenance worker who saw the crash.
     Four people were declared dead shortly after the 5 p.m. crash,
 state police said. Two men in their 20s were flown to Rhode Island
 Hospital for treatment, hospital spokesman Rick Piester said.
     A fifth victim died later Saturday at the hospital. The surviv-
 ing passenger was in critical condition late Saturday.
     Gas from a ruptured fuel tank leaked from the plane, Roan said.
 Several firefighters were hurt in two explosions at the scene, but
 the injuries were not serious.
     Distraught staff of the Boston-Providence Skydiving Center hug-
 ged, cried and stared at the fire trucks and ambulances that crowded
 the runway.
     One young man who said he knew some of the victims sat on the
 ground staring numbly at the crash site.
     "I don't feel like I can talk about it right now," he said.
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           Plane with 10 on board crashes in Malaysia
     KUALA LUMPUR (September 7, 1997 00:57 a.m. EDT) - A Dornier 228
 aircraft with 10 people on board crashed on the Malaysian part of
 Borneo island on Saturday night, reports said Sunday.
     It is not known if the eight passengers and two pilots survived
 the accident, Bernama news agency reported, quoting the Department
 of Civil Aviation (DCA) officials.
     Two of the passengers were Japanese, one was a Singaporean and
 one a Sri Lankan, a Royal Brunei Airlines (RBA) official said. The
 other six were all Malaysians, including the two pilots.
     The passengers were not named.
     A Royal Malaysian Air Force rescue team has been sent on foot
 into the heavily forested and mountainous area to search for pos-
 sible survivors, with backup from civilian helicopters.
     The wreckage of the 19-seat aircraft was spotted by civil avi-
 ation officials at 7:10 a.m. Sunday at Lambir Hill, near the old
 town of Miri on the island, in the eastern Sarawak state.
     The aircraft, flight number BI 238, was flying from the Brunei
 capital Bandar Seri Begawan to Miri.
     It belongs to a Miri-based aircraft company, Merpati Intan Sdn,
 Bhd., and is operated by Royal Brunei Airlines, the agency said.
     Aviation officials said the aircraft should have arrived in Miri
 at 7:38 p.m. Saturday. It was last in contact with Miri airport's
 control tower at 7:44 p.m.
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       Two killed when vintage WWII plane crashes in Michigan
     RAISINVILLE TOWNSHIP, Mich. (September 6, 1997 9:09 p.m. EDT) --
 A vintage World War II plane crashed on the side of a roadway Satur-
 day morning, killing the pilot and a passenger.
     State police said the pilot, Paul J. Peters, 57, of Saline, was
 apparently trying to land the plane on Michigan Highway 50. Wit-
 nesses told police that smoke was coming from the P-51 Mustang
 before the crash.
     Peters and Mary Ann Jones, 35, of Toledo, Ohio, died in the
 crash. Authorities said the cause of the crash was not immediately
 known.
     The plane was flying from Toledo to Ypsilanti's Willow Run Air-
 port when it crashed at 11:03 a.m., authorities said.
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 Cambodians buy back last crash flight recorder
     PHNOM PENH, Cambodia - 7 September 1997  - Cambodian aviation
 authorities had to buy back a "black box" flight voice recorder
 pilfered from the site of a Vietnam Airlines crash in Phnom Penh,
 an aviation official said on Saturday.
     The recorder was the last of three flight recorders from the
 Tupolev Tu-134 that crashed on Wednesday as it was approaching
 Phnom Penh's Pochentong Airport, killing 64 of the 66 people on
 board. Two young children survived the crash.
     "We recovered the third flight recorder from villagers," Keo
 Sivorn, director of operations at Cambodia's civil aviation
 authority, told Reuters.
     "We had to buy it for the analysis, even though the price was
 high," he said. He declined to say how much was paid for the
 recorder.
     Aviation authorities recovered a stand-by flight data recorder
 soon after the crash but another data recorder and the voice re-
 corder were looted after hordes of onlookers descended on the crash
 site.
     The looted data recorder was recovered in early on Friday and
 the voice recorder was retrieved late that day.
     Keo Sivorn said the aircraft's Russian manufacturer was being
 contacted through the Russian Embassy in Phnom Penh but it had
 not yet been decided if a Russian expert would come to Cambodia
 to analyze the recorders or if they would be sent to Russia for
 analysis.
     The plane, on a flight from Ho Chi Minh City in southern Viet-
 nam, was coming in to land at Pochentong airport through heavy rain
 clouds.
     Investigators said they suspected the pilot came out of the
 cloud, realised he was off course and tried unsuccessfully to abort
 the landing.
     The aircraft struggled to gain height, smashed through some palm
 trees and crashed in a muddy rice field.
--- DB 1.39/004487
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