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A Congolese airliner crashed into a market district in the eastern city of Goma yesterday, killing at least 33 people and injuring 80, the government said. The Hewa Bora Airways McDonnell Douglas DC-9 plowed into a crowded neighbourhood of Goma, capital of Democratic Republic of Congo's eastern North Kivu Province, after bad weather forced the pilot to abort takeoff.

Government spokesman Esdras Kambale said in a broadcast on national television that 33 people were killed and 80 injured in the crash, but gave no further details. Dirk Cramers, marketing director of Hewa Bora, said the majority of the 79 passengers aboard the plane had survived and that of 21 confirmed dead so far, he believed all were killed in the Birere market district that was struck by the airliner when it failed to lift off.

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