TOKYO: Five people aboard a Japan coast guard aircraft died Tuesday when it hit a Japan Airlines passenger plane on the ground in a fiery collision at Tokyo’s Haneda airport.

All 379 passengers and crew on board the passenger plane which burst into flames were safely evacuated, Japanese transport minister Tetsuo Saito told reporters.

But five of the six crew members from the smaller plane — bound for central Japan after Monday’s huge earthquake — died, Saito said.