An A330-200 plane operated by Libya's Afriqiyah Airways crashed on approach to Tripoli airport early Wednesday, killing 103 people.

It was on a regular flight from Johannesburg, South Africa, and was due to fly on to London's Gatwick airport.

A330 is a two-engine, wide-body passenger aeroplane made by Airbus.Built at Toulouse in France, more than 680 units have been delivered worldwide. By the end of March 2010, some 1,100 A330s were on order.

First flown in 1992, the A330 was developed at the same time as the four-engined Airbus A340, and was designed with common fuselage and wing components.

There are two main types of Airbus A330: the 200 series and the 300 series.

The seating capacity of A330-200 is around 250 to 300.

So far, the Airbus A330 has been involved in 10 incidents, including two confirmed hull-loss accidents (crashes in which the aircraft destroyed) and three other losses.

On June 1, 2009, Air France Flight 447, an Airbus A330-203 en route from Rio de Janeiro to Paris with 228 people onboard, was lost over the Atlantic Ocean. Malfunctioning pitot tubes have been an early focus of the investigation.

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