At least 13 people were killed and 23 injured when their Tunisair charter flight crashed into the sea near Sicily yesterday after reporting a technical fault, emergency services said.
The plane was carrying 34 Italians and five crew from Bari, in southeastern Italy, to the popular Tunisian resort island of Djerba when it encountered a "lack of engine power", according to Tuninter, the charter arm of the Tunisian airline that operated the flight.
The pilot made a distress call to Palermo airport and said he wanted to make an emergency landing.
Reuters TV pictures showed dead bodies floating in the crystal clear Mediterranean alongside luggage and parts of fuselage. What looked to be the tail of the aircraft was floating adrift. Some of the survivors climbed onto the plane's wings as it it bobbed in the sea to await rescue. Casualties brought to shore in Palermo were helped out of rescue launches, many with bloody faces and ripped clothes, some yelling in pain.
The port was crowded with ambulances while helicopters buzzed overhead. The Palermo coastguard said of the 34 passengers and five crew, 13 were dead, 23 injured, of whom six seriously, and three were missing.
The search and rescue mission continued well into the night and rescue services were slowly dragging a chunk of fuselage back to shore, the coastguard said.
The crash was Italy's worst air accident since 2001 when 118 people were killed at Milan's Linate airport when a private jet collided in heavy fog into an SAS airliner.
Palermo airport was the site of another airline disaster in 1978, when an Alitalia plane missed the runway by several miles and plummeted into the water, killing more than 100 people. Most of the victims drowned because of delays in rescue efforts.
The ATR 72, made by Avions de Transport Regional, can carry up to 72 passengers.