• The safest place to be sitting if your plane does crash is most likely in a middle seat near the back of the plane.
• Plane crashes are extremely rare, so these incidents don't happen often.
• But data from past crashes and crash tests shows that the back of the plane is probably safest.

Plane crashes are exceptionally rare.

But as the recent engine failure on Southwest Airlines flight 1380 has shown, it's still possible for something to go wrong.

On Tuesday, one engine on the plane disintegrated, spraying shrapnel that depressurized the plane and forced the pilot to make an emergency landing in Philadelphia. The incident resulted in the death of a passenger, which was the first fatality on a US passenger airline in more than nine years.

In the rare case that a plane goes down, some research indicates that the safest place to be sitting is in a middle seat near the back of a plane.

There haven't been many crash tests with jetliners. But in 2012, researchers decided to take an uncrewed Boeing 727, fill it with crash test dummies and cameras, and fly it into the Mexican Desert. (The Discovery Channel made a documentary about the effort.)

The researchers directed the plane into the ground as if it were attempting an emergency landing. As it turned out, the front of the plane wasn't a good place to be.

The cockpit was torn away and some of the seats in the front flew hundreds of feet. The impact, whiplash, and destruction at the front of the plane could have seriously injured or killed passengers seated in that area — likely those in the first class and more desirable seats.

Passengers at the back were still jostled around and in some cases likely to suffer head injuries, especially if they were not wearing seat-belts. But overall, they were much better off.

Those findings align with a 2015 analysis by Time magazine of the Federal Aviation Administration’s CSRTG Aircraft Accident Database. Looking at crash data from 17 plane crashes with seat charts that could be analyzed, researchers found that seats in the back third of a plane had a fatality rate of 32% in those incidents. Middle seats near the back had a 28% fatality rate.

Passengers seated in the middle third of the plane, by contrast, had a 39% fatality rate, and aisle seats in the middle of planes had a 44% fatality rate. Seats in the front third of the plane had a 38% rate. Although some researchers have calculated that aisle seats may be safer than middle or window seats, the Time analysis found that at least in the middle of the plane, they were the least safe. And middle seats near the back appeared to be safest.

Of course all crashes are different. If the back of a plane were to hit the ground first, it'd most likely be safer to be sitting in the front. But from the available crash data we have so far, people at the back seem to fare better, especially if they can get to an emergency exit.

It's worth reiterating that flying is far safer than other forms of transport. People's lifetime odds of dying in a car crash are 1 in 112 — close to 1%. Lifetime odds of dying in a plane crash are 1 in 8,000 — or about 0.0125%.

But if you're feeling nervous, go ahead and reserve one of those back seats.

Chris Weller wrote a previous version of this story.

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A military transport plane from the Air National Guard crashed near Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport in eastern Georgia at about 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday.

The Air Force identified the plane as a WC-130, a weather reconnaissance aircraft that has a minimal crew of five.

Nine people were aboard the plane at the time of the crash and five have been confirmed dead, ABC News reported, citing a Georgia Air National Guard captain.

The plane belonged to the Air National Guard 156th Airlift Wing based in Puerto Rico, according to Oriana Pawlyk, a reporter for Military.com.

A representative from the guard's public-affairs department confirmed the crash to the Savannah Morning News but did not provide additional details.

The Air National Guard was not immediately available for comment.

The Chatham County Emergency Management Agency said in a tweet: "There has been a plane crash at the intersection of Hwy 21 at Crossgate Rd. Roads will be shut down. Please avoid the area."

The Savannah Professional Firefighters Association tweeted an image of the wreckage, showing flames and a large plume of smoke, adding: "Military c130 down at 21 and Gulfstream Rd. Avoid the area. 21 shut down until further notice."

A spokeswoman for the Port Wentworth Fire Department told HuffPost that black smoke could be seen pouring into the sky and that "everyone scrambled" to the scene when the call came in.

Here's what the highway looked like after the crash:

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• Cuba's state-run media reported that a Cubana Airlines Boeing 737 crashed shortly after takeoff on Friday.
• The flight was headed from José Martíi International Airport in Havana to the city of Holguín in the eastern part of Cuba.
• Reports said there were 104 passengers on board.

A passenger jet on Friday crashed after taking off from José Martíi International Airport in Havana, Cuba. According to CNN, Cuba's state-run television reported that the aircraft involved was a Boeing 737 operated by the country's state-owned carrier, Cubana Airlines.

Witnesses told the AFP that they saw a large column of smoke appear near the airport.

The flight was believed to be Cubana Flight 972 from Havana to the city of Holguín in the eastern part of the country. There were 104 passengers on board. Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said there was a high number of victims.

The AP reports, citing a military officer, that there were only three survivors of the crash and all were in critical conditions. Other officials declined to confirm the survivor totals for the AP.

The aircraft involved in the incident was reportedly a Boeing 737 wet-leased by Cubana Airlines from Mexican airline Global Air. (According to aviation-tracking website Flightradar24, the aircraft involved in the incident was initially believed to be a 26-year-old Boeing 737-400 operated by Blue Panorama Airlines for Cubana Airlines. But Blue Panorama has since told Flightradar24 that its plane was not involved.)

In a statement to Business Insider, Boeing said it was "aware of news reports out of Cuba and closely monitoring the situation." According to CBS News, this was Cuba's third major fatal crash since 2010.

Cubana's director general told state media that the US embargo has made it difficult to acquire new-generation aircraft and parts for its existing fleet, CBS News reported.

The airline has flown 11,700 more passengers than expected from January to April 2018.

An earlier version of this story, based in part on a CNN report, misstated that the plane was headed to Guyana.

This story is developing. Check back for updates.

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• Three survivors are in grave condition after a Boeing 737 went down in Havana, Cuba, on Friday.
• The plane was carrying 104 mainly Cuban passengers and six crew members.
• The crash is Cuba's worst aviation disaster in three decades.

HAVANA (AP) — The only three survivors of a plane crash in Cuba remained in grave condition Saturday as investigators tried to determine why an aging Boeing 737 carrying 110 people went down and erupted in flames shortly after takeoff in Havana.

It was Cuba's worst aviation disaster in three decades and its third major air accident since 2010. Skies were overcast and rainy at the airport at the time of Friday's disaster and Cuban state television said the 39-year-old jet veered sharply to the right after departing on a domestic flight to the eastern city of Holguin.

"The only thing we heard, when we were checking in, an explosion, the lights went out in the airport and we looked out and saw black smoke rising and they told us a plane had crashed," Argentine tourist Brian Horanbuena told The Associated Press at the airport.

Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel said a special commission had been formed to find the cause of the crash. The plane had 104 mainly Cuban passengers and six crew members.

"Things have been organized, the fire has been put out, and the remains are being identified," he said.

State airline Cubana, which operated the flight, has had a generally good safety record but is notorious for delays and cancellations and has taken many of its planes out of service because of maintenance problems in recent months, prompting it to hire charter aircraft from other companies.

Mexican officials said the Boeing 737-201 was built in 1979 and rented by Cubana from Aerolineas Damojh, a small charter company that also goes by the name Global Air.

Cubana Flight 972 went down just after noon a short distance from the end of the runway at Jose Marti International Airport. Firefighters rushed to extinguish the flames that engulfed the debris left where the jet hit the ground in a cassava field.

'A tragedy for us'

Four crash survivors were taken to a Havana hospital, and three remained alive as of late Friday. State media reports stopped short of openly declaring that the rest on board were dead, but there was no word of other survivors by Friday night.

Relatives of those aboard were ushered into a private area at the terminal to await word on their loved ones.

"My daughter is 24, my God, she's only 24!" cried Beatriz Pantoja, whose daughter Leticia was on the plane.

A statement from Mexico's Transportation Department identified the pilot and co-pilot as Capt. Jorge Luis Nunez Santos and first officer Miguel Angel Arreola Ramirez. It said the flight attendants were Maria Daniela Rios, Abigail Hernandez Garcia and Beatriz Limon. Global Air said maintenance worker Marco Antonio Lopez Perez was also aboard.

Outside the company's Mexico City offices, former Global Air flight attendant Ana Marlen Covarrubias said she had worked for the company for over seven years and knows nearly all the crew members.

"I don't have the words. I'm very sad. We're in mourning," she said in tears. "It was something really, really, really terrible; a tragedy for us."

In addition to the Mexican crew, Cuban Communist Party newspaper Granma reported that the passengers were mostly Cubans plus five foreigners from countries it did not identify. Argentina's Foreign Ministry said two of its citizens had died in the crash.

In November 2010 a Global Air flight originating in Mexico City made an emergency landing in Puerto Vallarta because its front landing gear did not deploy. The fire was quickly extinguished, and none of the 104 people aboard were injured. That plane was a 737 first put into service in 1975.

Mexican aviation authorities said a team of experts would fly to Cuba on Saturday to take part in the investigation.

First Vice President Salvador Valdes Mesa had met with Cubana officials on Thursday to discuss improvements to its service. The airline blames its spotty record on a lack of parts and airplanes because of the U.S. trade embargo against the communist-run country.

Last year a Cuban military plane crashed into a hillside in the western province of Artemisa, killing eight soldiers. In 2010, an AeroCaribbean flight from Santiago to Havana went down in bad weather, killing all 68 people on board, including 28 foreigners, in what was the country's worst air disaster in more than two decades.

The last deadly accident involving a Cubana-operated plane was in 1989, when a charter flight from Havana to Milan, Italy, crashed shortly after takeoff, killing all 126 people on board and at least two dozen on the ground.

___

Associated Press writer Amy Guthrie contributed to this report from Mexico City.

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• The Mexican company whose plane crashed in Cuba on Friday with over 100 passengers aboard had received multiple safety complaints before the incident.
• The Boeing 737 involved in the crash was reportedly not allowed to fly in the airspace over Guyana.
• The plane and crew were being rented by a Honduras-based airline but Cuba's Transportation Minister said that the Mexican company Damojh was responsible for maintenance.

HAVANA (AP) — The Mexican charter company whose 39-year-old plane crashed in Havana had been the subject of two serious complaints about its crews' performance over the last decade, according to authorities in Guyana and a retired pilot for Cuba's national airline.

Mexico's government said late Saturday that its National Civil Aviation Authority will carry out an operational audit of Damojh airlines to see if its "current operating conditions continue meeting regulations" and to help collect information for the investigation into Friday's crash in Cuba that left 110 dead.

The plane that crashed, a Boeing 737, was barred from Guyanese airspace last year after authorities discovered that its crew had been allowing dangerous overloading of luggage on flights to Cuba, Guyanese Civil Aviation Director Capt. Egbert Field told The Associated Press on Saturday.

The plane and crew were being rented from Mexico City-based Damojh by EasySky, a Honduras-based low-cost airline. Cuba's national carrier, Cubana de Aviacion, was also renting the plane and crew in a similar arrangement known as a "wet lease" before the aircraft veered on takeoff to the eastern Cuban city of Holguin and crashed into a field just after noon Friday, according to Mexican aviation authorities.

A Damojh employee in Mexico City declined to comment, saying the company would be communicating only through written statements. Mexican authorities said Damojh had permits needed to lease its aircraft and had passed a November 2017 verification of its maintenance program. They announced a new audit late Saturday.

Cuban Transportation Minister Adel Yzquierdo Rodriguez told reporters Saturday afternoon that Cubana had been renting the plane for less than a month under an arrangement in which the Mexican company was entirely responsible for maintenance of the aircraft.

Armando Daniel Lopez, president of Cuba's Institute of Civil Aviation, told the AP that Cuban authorities had not received any complaints about the plane in that month. He declined to comment further.

Yzquierdo said it was routine for Cuba to rent planes under a variety of arrangements because of what he described as the country's inability to purchase its own aircraft due to the U.S. trade embargo on the island. Cuba has been able to buy planes produced in other countries, including France and Ukraine, but has pulled many from service due to maintenance problems and other issues.

"It's normal for us to rent planes," he said. "Why? Because it's convenient and because of the problem of the blockade that we have. Sometimes we can't buy the planes that we need, and we need to rent them."

Sometimes we can't buy the planes that we need, and we need to rent them.

He said that with Damojh, "the formula here is that they take care of the maintenance of the aircraft. That's their responsibility."

He said Cuba didn't have pilots certified to fly the Boeing, so it had hired the Mexican crew with the expectation that they were fully trained and certified by the proper authorities.

Yzquierdo also said the jet's "black box" voice recorder had been recovered and that Cuban officials had granted a U.S. request for investigators from Boeing to travel to the island.

Eyewitness and private salon owner Rocio Martinez said she heard a strange noise and looked up to see the plane with a turbine on fire.

"It had an engine on fire, in flames, it was falling toward the ground," Martinez said, adding that the plane veered into the field where it crashed, avoiding potential fatalities in a nearby residential area.

Field told AP that the Boeing 737 with tail number XA-UHZ had been flying four routes a week between Georgetown, Guyana, and Havana starting in October 2016. Cubans do not need visas to travel to Guyana, and the route was popular with Cubans working as "mules" to bring suitcases crammed with goods back home to the island, where virtually all consumer products are scarce and more expensive than in most other countries.

After Easy Sky canceled a series of flights in spring 2017, leaving hundreds of Cubans stranded at Guyana's main airport, authorities began inspecting the plane and discovered that crews were loading excessive amounts of baggage, leading to concerns the aircraft could be dangerously overburdened and unbalanced. In one instance, Guyanese authorities discovered suitcases stored in the plane's toilet.

"This is the same plane and tail number," Guyanese Infrastructure Minister David Patterson said. He and other Guyanese authorities said they did not immediately know if the crew suspended last May was the same one that died in Friday's crash. Damojh operates three Boeing 737s, two 737-300s and the 737-201 that crashed Friday, according to Mexican officials.

Ovidio Martinez Lopez, a pilot for Cubana for over 40 years until he retired six years ago, wrote in a post on Facebook that a plane rented from the Mexican company by Cubana briefly dropped off radar while over the city of Santa Clara in 2010 or 2011, triggering an immediate response by Cuban aviation security officials.

As a result, Cuban officials suspended a captain and co-pilot for "serious technical knowledge issues," and Cuba's Aviation Security authority issued a formal recommendation that Cubana stop renting planes and crews from Damojh, Martinez wrote.

"They are many flight attendants and security personnel who refused to fly with this airline," Martinez wrote. "On this occasion, the recommendation was overlooked and they rented from them again."

Contacted by AP in Havana, Martinez confirmed his Facebook account but declined to comment further.

Mexican officials said the Boeing 737-201 was built in 1979.

Mexican aviation authorities said a team of experts would fly to Cuba on Saturday to take part in the investigation.

SEE ALSO: Boeing passenger jet with over 100 passengers crashes after taking off from Havana

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• A small plane crashed off the coast of Long Island in New York on Saturday, CBS New York reports.
• According to the station, two of the four passengers on the plane have been confirmed dead, while the other two were missing as of Saturday evening.
• The crash reportedly occurred during a storm that prevented the plane from staying in contact with an airport control tower. 
• The Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board will launch an investigation into the cause of the crash, according to CBS New York.
  
  

A small plane crashed and killed at least two people in New York on Saturday, CBS New York reports.

The Piper PA31 Navajo Aircraft crashed off the coast of Long Island near East Hampton, according to the US Coast Guard. The crash was reported to the Coast Guard around 2:50 p.m.

According to CBS New York, two of the four passengers on the plane have been confirmed dead, while the other two were missing as of Saturday evening.

The television station reports that the pilot was 47-year-old Jon Dollard and the passengers were 22-year-old William Maerov, 70-year-old Bernard Krupinski, and 70-year-old Bonnie Krupinski, though it has not been disclosed which passengers were confirmed dead and which were missing.

The crash reportedly occurred during a storm that prevented the plane from staying in contact with an airport control tower. 

The Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board will launch an investigation into the cause of the crash, according to CBS New York.

In March, a helicopter crashed into the East River in New York City, killing all five of its passengers. The pilot was able to escape and survived the incident.

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• Although plane crashes are relatively rare, the death toll is usually high due to a large number of people onboard.
• Sometimes, people get lucky and become the sole survivors of plane crashes.
• But, for many of these survivors, living through the crash was only the beginning as they then had to survive dire conditions.

Recentincidents involving individuals being sucked out of broken plane windows have renewed a nationwide conversation about air travel safety. And although flying is much safer than traveling by car, when plane crashes do occur, the death toll can be tragically high.

However, sometimes — whether by luck or strength — individuals manage to become the sole survivors of deadly plane crashes. Here are the stories of six people who beat the odds and lived to tell the tale.

Annette Herfkens survived on solely rainwater after her plane crashed into a mountain.

In 1992, Vietnamese Airlines Flight VN474 crashed into a remote mountain range in Vietnam. All 29 passengers and crew members died except Dutch native Annette Herfkens, who lost her fiancé in the crash. Incredibly, she wasn't wearing her seatbelt at the time of the crash.

Although she had two fractured hips, a collapsed lung, a broken jaw, and gangrene, she survived alone in the wilderness for eight days, subsisting on rainwater, before she was found by a local policeman.

Juliane Koepcke survived a plane crash and 11 days in the Amazon rainforest.

LANSA Flight 508 was en route from Lima, Peru, to a town in the Amazon rainforest when it was struck by lightning and broke apart in mid-air. Juliane Koepcke, 17, was the sole survivor; the other 91 people onboard died.

The German national fell more than two miles to the canopy of the rainforest and received only minor injuries. She spent 11 days in the jungle using survival skills her father had taught her. By following water downstream, she came upon a boat and was soon rescued.

Bahia Bakari clung to floating debris for nine hours after her plane fell into the Indian Ocean.

When Yemenia Flight 626 stalled and plummeted into the Indian Ocean in 2009, 152 people were killed. The sole survivor was 15-year-old Bahia Bakari of France. She clung to floating debris for nine hours and later recalled that, although she initially heard voices of other survivors in the water around her, they soon disappeared. She was discovered by a volunteer sailor named Libouna Selemani Matrafi with a search party.

It took 18 hours for plane crash survivor Nestor Mata to be carried down a mountain to safety.

The 1957 crash of an army plane into a mountain in Cebu, Philippines, killed the country's newly-elected president, Ramon Magsaysay, as well as 25 other passengers and crew.

The only survivor was journalist Nestor Mata, who had third-degree burns all over his body. About five hours after regaining consciousness, he was found by locals. It took 12 men, taking turns, 18 hours to carry Mata down the mountain in a hammock.

After his plane crashed, George Lamson Jr. was discovered still strapped to his seat.

In 1985, moments after takeoff, Galaxy Airlines Flight 203 crashed into a field in Reno, Nevada, killing 70 passengers and crew members. Passenger George Lamson Jr., then 17, was launched through a fireball created by the crash and was discovered sitting in his original seat with his seatbelt fastened in a nearby street. He was the sole survivor.

Flight attendant Vesna Vulovic survived a fall of 33,000 feet when her plane crashed.

When JAT Flight 367 exploded over Czechoslovakia in 1972, Serbian flight attendant Vesna Vulovic, who had only been on the job for eight months at the time, remained in the fuselage and fell more than 33,000 feet — and lived to tell the tale. The other 27 individuals onboard perished. She set a Guinness World Record for the longest recorded fall without a parachute. She was discovered by an unnamed villager.

Vulovic had a fractured skull, broken legs, and three broken vertebrae. Although she was temporarily paralyzed and in a coma, she later recovered. She had no memory of the crash or her fall.

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• A pilot on board the plane that crashed in April killing six people had cocaine in his system, according to the medical examiner.
• 28-year-old James Pedroza, a student pilot, was sitting in the front of the aircraft when it crashed, though it is unclear if he was in control as another pilot was on board.
• However, it is understood that Pedroza owned the Piper PA-24 aircraft.
• The report confirmed that he and the five other passengers, who included Instagram influencers and models, perished in the crash.

A pilot on board the plane that crashed in Scottsdale, Arizona in April killing six people including Instagram stars and models had cocaine in his system.

The Maricopa County Medical Examiner's Office said 28-year-old James Pedroza was sitting in the front of the Piper PA-24 aircraft when it crashed on April 9, according to Arizona Republic.

In a tribute to the victims back in April, Facebook user named Jeremy Gail said that Pedroza, who had 12,000 followers on Instagram and called himself an "avid traveler, pilot, and business owner," had recently purchased the plane.

However, it is not clear if he was in control of the plane at the time of the crash — certified pilot Erik Valente, 26, was also sitting with him.

Autopsy reports released this week confirmed that the two men died in the crash along with four other victims — 23-year-old Mariah Sunshine Coogan, 26-year-old Anand Patel, 22-year-old Helena Lagos, and 23-year-old Iris Rodriguez Garcia.

Coogan, who had nearly 28,000 Instagram followers, was reportedly an aspiring model.

The plane was headed for Las Vegas, but crashed at the TPC Scottsdale golf course shortly after takeoff.

CBS News reported that Pedroza had checked in with air traffic control just moments before the plane went down but did not indicate there was an issue.

"Are you experiencing any difficulty?" an air traffic controller asked.

Pedroza replied: "Uh, we're good, we're just a training lesson."

A previously released preliminary crash report had determined that the six-seater plane had struggled to gain altitude on departure, and its wings were "rocking during and shortly after" takeoff.

The video below, posted to Twitter, appeared to show the fiery crash:

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Flying in a plane is not only the fastest way to get to a destination, it’s also the safest. Despite this fact, engine issues, bad weather, and even pilot errors can occur and lead to a plane crash. But even when these rarities occur, there are often survivors who make it off the plane alive.

These stories of plane crash survivors are proof that even when the odds are against people, they can still find a way to make it out of unimaginable circumstances. Chances are very high that most of us will never have to experience a plane crash, but there are plenty of people who have and have lived to tell the tale.

A 4-year-old girl ended up being the only survivor of a 1987 plane crash that also killed her parents and brother.

In 1987, Northwest flight 255 crashed after takeoff from Detroit after an electrical failure meant the crew wasn’t alerted to the fact that the flaps hadn’t been set properly before takeoff. On its way up, the plane’s left wing struck a light pole and went down, bursting into flames as it hit the ground. When rescuers arrived at the accident, they found 4-year-old Cecilia Cichan still strapped into her seat, and although she lost both parents and her brother in the crash, she herself survived with a broken leg and third-degree burns.

Cichan grew up to graduate with a degree in psychology in 2006, and in a 2013 interview with ABC News, she said the accident is something she thinks about every day.

"When I realized I was the only person to survive that plane crash, I was maybe in middle school, high school maybe," she said. "Being an adolescent and confused, so it was just extra stress for me. I remember feeling angry and survivor's guilt. Why didn't my brother survive? Why didn't anybody? Why me?"

Carolyn Cross thought she was going to die when her plane crashed into a busy road in 2011.

Thanks to an unsecured oil cap on the aircraft, a Northern Thunderbird Air flight headed to Kelowna, British Columbia, in 2011 crashed on a six-lane street during rush hour. Although the pilot recognized that there was a leak and tried to turn around and return to the airport, it was too late. The plane crashed, killing the pilots thought miraculously all seven passengers survived.

One of them was 49-year-old Carolyn Cross, who was sure she would die in the crash, sending emails to her husband children as the plane turned around.

According to what Carolyn told the website Chatelaine, she blacked out as the plane was falling and woke up later when she smelled fuel. She managed to drag herself to the door of the plane, and someone who witnessed the accident was able to carry her to safety. Her list of injuries was long — including broken ribs and teeth as well as jaw and head trauma — but she was able to eventually recover and return home to her family.

A plane crashed into the Colombian mountains in 2016, killing 71. One survivor said following protocol saved his life.

Only six people survived when LaMia Flight 2933 crashed into the Colombian mountains in 2016, killing 71 people, including most members of the Chapecoense soccer team. A probe found that the plane didn’t have enough fuel to make it to its destination. 

Among the survivors was crew member Erwin Tumiri, who told Mirror that following protocol is what saved him.

"I saved myself because I followed the emergency protocol, putting bags between my legs and put myself in the fetal position," he said. "I also saw how many passengers rose and began to scream."

• A plane crashed in Costa Rica on Sunday, killing all 12 people on board. According to Costa Rican authorities, 10 of those passengers were US citizens.
• The crash happened near Punta Islita in the Guanacaste province, according to Costa Rican officials who posted images of the burning wreckage amid a thicket of trees.
• It was not immediately clear what caused the crash. The identities of all the passengers were not immediately known.

Costa Rican authorities said a plane crash there killed 12 people on Sunday, including 10 US citizens, the Associated Press and Reuters reported, citing Costa Rican government officials. It happened near Punta Islita in the country's Guanacaste province, about 140 miles west of the capital San José.

The plane went down in a heavily wooded area. Photos released by the country's security ministry show the burning wreckage among a thicket of trees.

Laura Chinchilla, the former president of Costa Rica, tweeted that a cousin of hers, who was one of the crew members, died in the crash.

"There are no people alive," Security Minister Gustavo Mata said, adding that autopsies would be needed to confirm the total number and identities of victims because their remains were badly burned.

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Airplane turbulence may seem like the end of the road, but, statistically, there is no data of a plane crash caused by turbulence. Here's why turbulence is caused, and why it shouldn't stop you from booking your next flight.

Following is a transcript of the video.

Why turbulence is no big deal. It can feel like the scariest part of flying, but turbulence is no cause for alarm.

Turbulence is a sudden change in airflow. It can be caused by a number of factors. The most common cause is turbulent air in the atmosphere.

Jet streams trigger sudden changes in wind speed that can rock the plane. Another type is thermal turbulence. It's created by hot rising air, usually from cumulus clouds or thunderstorms.

Mechanical turbulence is caused by the landscape. Mountains or tall buildings can distort the wind flow in the sky above them.

Airplanes can also create turbulence. The wings cause wake turbulence as it passes through the air. This can affect planes flying behind one another. It's why planes avoid taking the same flight path on take-offs and landings. Pilots and air traffic control do a lot to avoid turbulence.

But even when they do run into it, the risk is low. Modern aircraft are built to withstand even severe turbulence. They can quickly rise and fall up, to 100 feet. As a result, turbulence hasn't caused a plane crash in over 40 years.

Unfortunately, turbulence has been on the rise. Since 1958, turbulence rose 40% to 90% over Europe and North America. Studies suggest climate change could cause it to be worse by 2050.

When booking seats, aim for ones closest to the wings. These will be the smoothest in turbulence. For now, trust your pilot, be smart, and buckle up.

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• Costa Rica's civil aviation agency suspended a local airline after a plane crash killed 12 people.
• Civil aviation authorities called it a preventative measure.

SAN JOSE (Reuters) - Costa Rica's civil aviation agency suspended local airline Nature Air on Friday, two weeks after one of its small planes crashed near a tourist beach, killing two Costa Rican pilots and 10 U.S. citizens.

Ennio Cubillo, director of the civil aviation agency, informed Nature Air in a letter that it "preventatively" suspended all operations because several key employees were no longer with the company.

"It doesn't directly have to do with the accident," said a civil aviation source who declined to be named because the investigation is still proceeding.

Nature Air's pilot training director died in the crash on New Year's Eve near the Punta Islita beach town about 140 miles (230 km) west of the capital, San Jose. The co-pilot was also killed, along with a family of five from New York.

Nature Air's operations manager quit this week and its aerial security director has requested a leave of absence.

"Nature Air doesn't have, at the moment, a reliable and effective management structure to guarantee the execution of safe air operations," said the letter from Cubillo, who has said the investigation could take months.

Investigators are analyzing weather conditions at the time of the crash, possible mechanical failures and human error to determine what caused the Cessna 208B Grand Caravan to plummet from the sky shortly after takeoff.

Earlier this week, Costa Rican authorities raided Nature Air's offices in what they described as a routine operation to collect information.

(Writing by Daina Beth Solomon; Editing by Peter Cooney)

SEE ALSO: 12 people, including 10 US citizens, killed in fiery plane crash in Costa Rica

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• A commercial plane skidded off a runway in the Turkish province of Trabzon.
• One of the pilots stated that one of the engines sped up as they were landing which caused the aircraft to veer off of a cliff.
• The plane came to a halt just metres away from the Black Sea. 

A commercial airplane that skidded off a runway after landing in northern Turkey dangled precariously off a muddy cliff with its nose only a few feet from the sea.

Images show the Boeing 737-800 on its belly and at an acute angle just above the water.

Preparations were underway on Sunday to begin moving it.

If it had stopped any further along the slope, the plane would have likely plunged into the Black Sea in the Turkish province of Trabzon.

The incident late Saturday created panic among the 162 passengers and crew on board the Pegasus Airlines flight, but they were all evacuated safely.

Trabzon Gov. Yucel Yavuz said Sunday that investigators were trying to determine why the plane had left the runway and that the airport would be closed until 8:00 a.m. (0500 GMT).

Produced by Jasper Pickering.

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• 71 people are dead after a plane crashed near Moscow.
• There were likely no survivors.
• The crash took place shortly after the plane took off from one of Moscow's airports. 

MOSCOW (AP) — A Russian passenger plane believed to be carrying 71 people crashed Sunday afternoon near Moscow, shortly after takeoff from one of the city's airports. No survivors were immediately reported.

The An-148 regional jet disappeared from radar screens a few minutes after departing from Domodedovo Airport en route to the city of Orsk, some 1,000 miles southeast of Moscow.

The plane reportedly belonged to Saratov Airlines, a Russian commercial carrier.

Plane fragments were found in the Ramenskoye area about 25 miles from the airport.

Footage on state television showed them strewn across a snowy field with no buildings nearby. It was unclear if there were any casualties among people on the ground at the crash site.

Russia's Investigative Committee said all possible crash causes were being looked into.

Shabby equipment and poor supervision had plagued Russian civil aviation for years after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, but its safety record has improved markedly in recent years.

The last large-scale crash in Russia occurred on Dec. 25, 2016, when a Tu-154 operated by the Russian Defense Ministry on its way to Syria crashed into the Black Sea minutes after takeoff from the southern Russian city of Sochi. All 92 people on board were killed.

In March 2016, a Boeing 737-800 flown by FlyDubai crashed while landing at Rostov-on-Don, killing all 62 people aboard.

An onboard bomb destroyed a Russian Metrojet airliner soon after taking off from Egypt's Sharm al-Sheikh resort, killing 244 people in October 2015.

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• A plane carrying 71 people crashed near an airport in Kathmandu, Nepal, on Monday.
• It crashed, veered off the runway, stopped in a nearby field, and burst into flames.
• The plane, a twin-propeller passenger craft, was arriving from Bangladesh.
• Officials have brought the death toll up to 49; reports indicated there were nearly two dozen survivors.

At least 49 people have died after a commercial plane crashed near an airport in Nepal on Monday.

Police spokesman Manoj Neupane confirmed the updated fatalities late Monday, the Washington Post reported. The remaining 22 survivors were still being treated at three hospitals, he added.

The plane, operated by the Bangladeshi airline US-Bangla, veered off the runway while landing at the Tribhuvan International Airport in the capital of Kathmandu shortly after 2 p.m. local time. 

The twin-propeller Bombardier Dash 8 had been carrying 67 passengers and four crew members from Dhaka, Bangladesh.

A survivor of the crash, Basanta Bohara, said the two-hour flight went as planned until the aircraft began "acting strangely" as it began its descent into Kathmandu, the Post reported.

Bohara, a Nepali tour operator, said the plane appeared to be wobbling before it crash-landed into a field near the airport and catching fire, according to the Post.

“Thank God I was able to escape through a cracked window,” Bohara told reporters at the Norvic International Hospital, where he was being treated along with several other survivors. “I hope I will survive now.”

Tribhuvan International Airport had closed for a few hours on Monday before reopening.

General manager of Tribhuvan International Airport, Raj Kumar Chhetri, told reporters at a press conference on Monday afternoon there was a “problem” with the plane's landing alignment.

Chhetri said air traffic control ordered the airplane not to land, but there was no response from the pilot. The US-Bangla plane missed hitting a parked aircraft on the tarmac before crashing into a field on the eastern side of the the airport, the Post reported.

US-Bangla Airlines CEO Imran Asif told reporters he disputed the details of the fateful call between air traffic control and the pilot.

“A three-minute conversation between the pilot and the air traffic control before the landing indicated that they sent wrong signal to the pilot,” Asif said, according to local online news site bdnews24.com.

Footage from the scene showed a plume of black smoke arising from the wreckage and dozens of firefighters, troops, and emergency personnel attending.

The aircraft was 17 years old, Reuters reported.  

Nepal is a landlocked, mountainous region with a poor record of air safety.

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• The Instagram star Mina Basaran was one of 11 people killed in a private-jet crash in Iran on Sunday.
• The plane had taken Basaran and seven friends to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates for her bachelorette party.
• It was traveling back to Istanbul when it gained altitude and then "dropped drastically," according to a flight-tracking website.
• Basaran was set to marry her fiancé, Murat Gezer, on April 14.

The Turkish Instagram star and construction heiress Mina Basaran was one of 11 people killed in a private-jet crash in Iran on Sunday.

Reports indicated the Bombardier Challenger 604 jet crashed in the Zagros Mountains outside Shahr-e Kord, a city that sits roughly 230 miles south of the Iranian capital, Tehran.

The crash killed all 11 people aboard the plane, including three crew members, according to the Associated Press. Authorities have recovered 10 bodies from the crash site.

The plane was headed to Istanbul from the United Arab Emirates after Basaran, a bride-to-be, held her bachelorette party in Dubai with seven friends. She was due to marry her fiancé, Murat Gezer, on April 14. They are pictured below.

The AP reported that investigators found the black box from the plane, owned by the private holding company of Mina's millionaire father, Huseyin Basaran, on Monday.

Huseyin Basaran is the chairman of Basaran Investment Holding. According to the Evening Standard, he owns "several small businesses and a small investment bank" and is involved in construction projects such as series of luxury apartment blocks in Istanbul called Mina Towers, named after his daughter.

Mina Basaran, a socialite who had more than 85,000 followers on Instagram, was reportedly on the management board at her father's company and was next in line to run the business.

She had posted several photos on her Instagram account, which has now been made private, over the weekend, including an image of herself on the tarmac in front of the plane and another on board holding heart-shaped balloons. Her Facebook account has been changed into a tribute page.

The plane 'dropped drastically within minutes'

According to flight-tracking website FlightRadar24, the aircraft, which took off from Sharjah International Airport, near Dubai, on Sunday, rapidly gained altitude a little over an hour into the flight and then "dropped drastically within minutes."

While it is unknown what caused the crash, a witness told Iran's state television that the plane was on fire while in the air.

The black box could help investigators determine the cause of the crash, as the equipment typically records cockpit conversations and radio transmissions.

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• All six passengers were reportedly killed when a plane crashed at a golf course in Scottsdale, Arizona, on Monday night.
• A video posted to Facebook seems to show the passengers entering the plane before takeoff.
• While the police have not yet officially identified the victims, friends and relatives appear to have begun doing so on social media.

The identities of those killed in a plane crash in Scottsdale, Arizona, on Monday night are becoming clearer, with one passenger apparently posting a video to social media before takeoff.

A Federal Aviation Administration notice posted Tuesday said a Piper PA-24, which local reports indicated was headed for Las Vegas, crashed at the TPC Scottsdale golf course under "unknown circumstances" during takeoff.

A representative of the Scottsdale Police Department told The New York Times that all six people aboard the plane were killed.

A video posted to Twitter, seen below, appeared to show the fiery crash:

While the names of the victims have not yet been officially released, friends and family members appear to have identified them on social media.

The Arizona Republic said it had verified the identities of three of the victims through friends and relatives.

On Tuesday, a Facebook user named Jeremy Gail posted a tribute to some of the victims in which he identified four of the people traveling as Anand Patel, Mariah Coogan, Helena L, and James Pedroza, whom he said owned the aircraft and was piloting it.

The video in his post, shown above, appears to show people entering the back of the plane, laughing and looking into the camera.

Gail's post has been commented on and shared hundreds of times.

Tributes have also been pouring in via comments on Instagram profiles that appear to belong to Pedroza and Coogan.

Gail believes Pedroza, who had nearly 12,000 followers on Instagram, had recently purchased the plane.

Coogan, who had nearly 28,000 followers, was reportedly an aspiring model.

Gail also shared the Facebook profile of Anand "Happy" Patel.

Business Insider has contacted the Scottsdale Police Department for information on when the victims' identities will be officially released.

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• More than 250 people were killed when a military plane crashed in a field outside Algeria’s capital.
• It's the country's worst air disaster.
• Television footage showed crowds and emergency vehicles massing around the smoking and flaming wreckage.

ALGIERS (Reuters) - More than 250 people were killed when a military plane crashed in a field outside Algeria’s capital on Wednesday, state media said, in the country's worst air disaster.

Television footage showed crowds and emergency vehicles massing around the smoking and flaming wreckage near Boufarik airport southwest of Algiers.

A line of white body bags could be seen on the ground next to what media said was a Russian Ilyushin transport plane.

A total of 257 people were killed, most of them military, the defence ministry said. Ten crew and other people described as family members also died, and a number of survivors were being treated at an army hospital, the ministry added.

A member of Algeria’s ruling FLN party told the private Ennahar TV station the dead included 26 members of Polisario, an Algerian-backed group fighting for the independence of neighboring Western Sahara – a territory also claimed by Morocco in a long-running dispute.

The plane was heading to Tindouf, an area on Algeria’s border with Western Sahara, but crashed on the airport’s perimeter, Algeria’s defence ministry said.

Tindouf is home to thousands of refugees from the Western Sahara standoff, many of them Polisario supporters.

U.N. attempts to broker a settlement have failed for years in the vast desert area, which has contested since 1975 when Spanish colonial powers left. Morocco claimed the territory while Polisario established its self-declared Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic there.

Algeria’s defence ministry issued a statement expressing condolences to families of the victims.

An Air Algerie flight crashed in northern Mali carrying 116 passengers and crew, nearly half of them French, en route from Burkina Faso to Algeria in July 2014.

In February that year, an Algerian Air Force Lockheed C-130 Hercules crashed in a mountainous area in eastern Algeria killing 77 passengers and leaving one survivor.

(Reporting by Lamine Chikhi, Hamid Ould Ahmed, Aidan Lewis, Ahmed Tolba and Ulf Laessing; Writing by Ulf Laessing and Aidan Lewis; Editing by John Stonestreet and Andrew Heavens)

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• The safest place to be sitting if your plane does crash is most likely in a middle seat near the back of the plane.
• Plane crashes are extremely rare, so these incidents don't happen often.
• But data from past crashes and crash tests shows that the back of the plane is probably safest.

Plane crashes are exceptionally rare.

But as the recent engine failure on Southwest Airlines flight 1380 has shown, it's still possible for something to go wrong.

On Tuesday, one engine on the plane disintegrated, spraying shrapnel that depressurized the plane and forced the pilot to make an emergency landing in Philadelphia. The incident resulted in the death of a passenger, which was the first fatality on a US passenger airline in more than nine years.

In the rare case that a plane goes down, some research indicates that the safest place to be sitting is in a middle seat near the back of a plane.

There haven't been many crash tests with jetliners. But in 2012, researchers decided to take an uncrewed Boeing 727, fill it with crash test dummies and cameras, and fly it into the Mexican Desert. (The Discovery Channel made a documentary about the effort.)

The researchers directed the plane into the ground as if it were attempting an emergency landing. As it turned out, the front of the plane wasn't a good place to be.

The cockpit was torn away and some of the seats in the front flew hundreds of feet. The impact, whiplash, and destruction at the front of the plane could have seriously injured or killed passengers seated in that area — likely those in the first class and more desirable seats.

Passengers at the back were still jostled around and in some cases likely to suffer head injuries, especially if they were not wearing seat-belts. But overall, they were much better off.

Those findings align with a 2015 analysis by Time magazine of the Federal Aviation Administration’s CSRTG Aircraft Accident Database. Looking at crash data from 17 plane crashes with seat charts that could be analyzed, researchers found that seats in the back third of a plane had a fatality rate of 32% in those incidents. Middle seats near the back had a 28% fatality rate.

Passengers seated in the middle third of the plane, by contrast, had a 39% fatality rate, and aisle seats in the middle of planes had a 44% fatality rate. Seats in the front third of the plane had a 38% rate. Although some researchers have calculated that aisle seats may be safer than middle or window seats, the Time analysis found that at least in the middle of the plane, they were the least safe. And middle seats near the back appeared to be safest.

Of course all crashes are different. If the back of a plane were to hit the ground first, it'd most likely be safer to be sitting in the front. But from the available crash data we have so far, people at the back seem to fare better, especially if they can get to an emergency exit.

It's worth reiterating that flying is far safer than other forms of transport. People's lifetime odds of dying in a car crash are 1 in 112 — close to 1%. Lifetime odds of dying in a plane crash are 1 in 8,000 — or about 0.0125%.

But if you're feeling nervous, go ahead and reserve one of those back seats.

Chris Weller wrote a previous version of this story.

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