Crash survivor: 'Tried to fight our way to front'

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It was unclear if weather played a part in the crash. It had stopped raining about one hour before the DC-9 took off at about 3 p.m., residents said.

Crew members and U.N. troops managed to evacuate most of the 79 passengers before the plane caught fire, said Dirk Cramers, a spokesman for the private Congolese company Hewa Bora Airways.

Mpaluku said 40 people had died and more than 110 were injured.

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Transport Minister Charles Mwando Nsimba warned that the death toll could rise.

"We have to take into account the fact that there are bodies still trapped under the rubble," he said, noting that only two of the bodies so far were of passengers.

The jetliner had been headed to the central city of Kisangani and then to the capital, Kinshasa, 700 miles to the west.

Congo, which is struggling to emerge from a 1998-2002 civil war, has experienced more fatal crashes since 1945 than any other African country, according to the nonprofit Aviation Safety Network.

Last week, the European Union added Hewa Bora to its list of airlines banned from flying in the EU. Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Alison Duquette said no Congolese airlines now fly into the U.S. although they are not banned from doing so.