Passenger plane with 22 people aboard crashes in Argentina

All 22 people aboard a commuter plane were killed when it crashed in southern Argentina, the airline said Thursday.

The Sol Lineas Aéreas plane was headed to the city of Mendoza from Cordoba Wednesday night when the pilot issued a distress call, said airline spokesman David Avellanda, according to CNN.

"There had been reports of an explosion in the sky, but they have no information on the fate of those on board," Mabel Yahuar, Mayor of the town of Los Menucos, told local media.

The remains of the airline Sol after crash were spread over a 100-metre-wide area near Prahuaniyeu, about 350 kilometers west of Bariloche.

The pilots of the plane made a distress call about 10:50 pm local time before the aircraft went down, International Business Times reports.

The pilots made several distress calls around 9 p.m. local time before the airliner disappeared from radar south of Los Menucos, according to The Aviation Herald, a website that monitors aviation accidents worldwide. The aircraft was later discovered crashed about 25 kilometers southwest of Los Menucos.

Reports quoting aviation sources in Argentina said that the crew had requested to descend out of icing conditions.

Burning wreckage of the aircraft was spread over a 100-meter-wide area in Rio Negro province, Dr. Ismael Ali, director of a hospital in Los Menucos, was quoted as saying after he returned from the crash site, RTT News reported on its site.