(Bloomberg) — A regional carrier flying from Tehran to Tabas incentral Iran crashed shortly after takeoff yesterday into aresidential area outside Mehrabad airport, leaving dozens dead.

The morning crash of the Iran-140 turboprop killed 40 passengersand 8 crew, Reza Dehghanpour, head of Tehran Emergency Services,told Iranian state television. Three with severe burns werehospitalized, he said. State-run Mehr news agency reported 40 weredead and eight injured; the Iranian Students News Agency said theconfirmed death toll was 38.

The Sepahan Air passenger plane slammed into a housing districtnear the airport at about 9:45 a.m., the official Islamic RepublicNews Agency reported, citing Red Crescent spokesman HosseinDerakhshan. Emergency crew at the site and investigators are tryingto determine the cause of the crash, he said. The two black boxeshave been recovered, Ahmad Majidi of the crisis management officeat the Transport Ministry told ISNA.

The aircraft, which seats about 50 people, crashed into a wallsurrounding an aviation base belonging to the Defense Ministry,said police at the scene.

Roads were blocked off and the area was surrounded by securitypersonnel, airport police and military police. Two fire trucks anda dozen firefighters were at the site.

Iran has one of the worst aviation safety records in the world.At least 77 died after a 37-year-old Boeing 727 crashed in 2010near the northern city of Orumiyeh.

From 2000 to 2006, 11 Iranian plane crashes claimed about 700lives, according to Press TV.

Explosions Heard

Masood Soltani, an employee at the nearby Elmi KarbordiUniversity who captured part of today's accident on his phone, saidhe heard five explosions.

“I came outside, there were clumps of steel everywhere and therewas lots of thick, black smoke,” Soltani said. “The first explosionwas quite weak but when the third happened I was outside and itthrew the tail of the plane to the other side of the street.”

The Iran-140 is a domestically assembled version of Ukraine'sAntonov An-140. Today's accident in Iran follows three other fatalairline crashes the past month, putting 2014 on course to be theworst year in almost a decade for passenger fatalities.

The crash of a McDonnell Douglas MD-83 aircraft on the edge ofthe Sahara desert on July 24 followed the loss of an ATR-72turboprop in storms in Taiwan on July 23 and the downing ofMalaysian Air Flight MH17 over Ukraine last month.

Foreign Fleet

Iran has been trying to modernize its foreign-built fleet ofjetliners amid international sanctions that block purchases fromsuppliers such as Chicago-based Boeing Co. and Toulouse,France-based Airbus Group NV. Restrictions on purchases of aircraftand parts force have forced Iranian officials in past years to buyused planes and get spare parts on the secondary market, hamperingsafety and competitiveness.

Iran Air has already grounded 10 aircraft due to a lack ofparts, with other Iranian airlines grounding about 90, Iran Air CEOFarhad Parvaresh said in June.

Iran needs about 400 passenger planes over the next decade onceforeign sanctions are lifted, Ali Reza Jahangirian, head of thecountry's Civil Aviation Organization, said in May.

Under a temporary accord over Iran's nuclear program reachedlast year with six world powers including the U.S., the PersianGulf country has been allowed to order safety-related spare partsfor its aging air fleet. Boeing confirmed last month that it has anagreement with Iran covering spare parts. Iran and world powers areseeking to finalize the nuclear deal — which would see a lifting ofsanctions against Iran — before it expires in November.

Mehrabad Airport is used mainly for domestic flights while ImamKhomeini Airport outside Tehran handles international flights.

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