News Bulletin : USAir 737 Crashes at LAX; 2 Die : Tragedy: There were 50 survivors, including 25 people hurt. Jetliner may have struck a small plane.

A USAir Boeing 737 jetliner crashed while landing at Los Angeles International Airport, skidded into a building and burst into flames Friday night. At least two people died and 25 were injured, officials said.

There were reports that the jetliner had struck a smaller commuter aircraft. It was not known if the collision occurred in the air or on the ground.

Jim Wells, a Fire Department spokesman, said there were 50 survivors. Twenty-five of them were being taken to hospitals, he said.

He did not know if anyone else was trapped inside the wreckage.

The crash occurred shortly after 6 p.m.

Most of the fuselage of the twin-engine USAir jetliner was engulfed in flames. At least a dozen fire engines sped to the runway on the north side of the passenger terminal and the flames were extinguished an hour later. Ambulances sped survivors to nearby hospitals.

The condition and precise whereabouts of the second aircraft, said by federal officials to belong to a commuter airline, were not known.

Officials said the flight--USAir 1493--originated in Syracuse, N. Y. After stops in Washington and Columbus, Ohio, the flight continued to Los Angeles for a scheduled 6:11 p.m. arrival. Night had fallen at the time of the crash.

The 737 came to rest with its nose against a one-story building across a taxiway from the runway. The structure was used to house a fire station, but is believed to be vacant.

The nose of the jetliner appeared to be severely damaged. There was a large hole in the top of the fuselage, and the tail section of the plane appeared to be partially torn away.

Orange flames boiled up from the fuselage, casting an eerie glow in the night sky. A large column of smoke rose above the airport.

A witness identified as Lynn Glenn told Channel 2 that there appeared to have been “a huge explosion” at the time of the crash. Glenn said he could not be sure if the explosion occurred just before the plane landed or at the moment it struck ground.

“The plane was coming down. Just before it came to the ground it looked like there was an explosion,” Glenn said. “It could have been just as it hit the ground, could have been before. . . . It was just a loud explosion. A loud explosion.”

Glenn said he saw flames and a column of “thick black smoke.”