By Vito Barcelo

EIGHTEEN flights carrying at least 800 passengers were diverted to other airports yesterday after a Zest Air plane crash-landed in Caticlan, the major gateway to the island resort of Boracay in Aklan province.

The airline?s newly-acquired MA60 turboprop, Flight CK685, arrived in Aklan around 6:40 a.m. but undershot the runway, said Reuben Ciron, director general of the Civil Aviation Authority.

Zest Airways, formerly Asian Spirit Airlines, acquired five MA60 turboprops from China only last year as part of a re-fleeting program that is expected to be completed this year.

A Canadian passenger who asked not to be named told Agence France-Presse the pilot appeared to have misjudged the landing due to strong winds.

The plane landed on the grass well short of the runway. Its left wing ploughed into a ditch, preventing the plane from hitting the airport terminal, witnesses said.

The plane instead smashed into an airport wall, narrowly missing the airport restaurant, said an AFP photographer who was at the scene.

Hospitals in the town of Malay and nearby Kalibo City treated the plane?s 24 passengers and five crewmen for various injuries after the plane made the hard landing.

Two of the passengers had serious fractures and cuts, officials in Malay said. The rest were treated for minor injuries and discharged. The nationalities of those seriously injured could not be immediately determined.

Ciron said the cause of the crash was not yet known at press time, but flight operations to Caticlan resumed at 1 p.m. after the plane was removed from the runway.

Airport officials said it was easy to misjudge the airport?s 950-meter runway, adding that was one reason most airlines do not fill their planes to full capacity.

An official of Cebu Pacific, which operates eight round trip flights daily from Manila to Caticlan, and one daily roundtrip flight from Cebu to Caticlan, said their ATR 72-500 planes could carry 72 passengers, but made do with only up to 60 because of the short runway.

Plans are afoot to expand the runway of the airport, which is considered the third busiest in the country after Manila and Cebu.

The government has approved a P2.5-billion project to increase the capacity of the airport terminal and extend the runway from 950 meters to 2,100 meters on reclaimed land.

Under the plan, the Civil Aviation Authority will manage the airport until 2010, while the project proponent, Caticlan International Airport and Development Corp., will take over its operation from 2011 to 2033. With Roderick dela Cruz and AFP