Weather normal during time of plane crash: official

Rescuers search for the black boxes at a plane crash site in Tengxian County, south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, March 22, 2022. (Xinhua/Zhou Hua)

NANNING, March 23 (Xinhua) -- The weather was normal and there were no hazardous weather conditions when a passenger plane with 132 people aboard crashed in south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, an official told a news briefing on Wednesday.

According to the air/ground communication records between the aircrew and air traffic controllers, they had maintained normal communication since the plane took off from Kunming until it suddenly dropped altitude en route to its destination, said Mao Yanfeng, head of the aviation accident investigation center of the Civil Aviation Administration of China.

The China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737 aircraft, which departed from the provincial capital of Yunnan and was bound for southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, crashed into a mountainous area in Tengxian County in Guangxi at 2:38 p.m. Monday.