Witnesses said the plane struck the bell tower of the La Dolorosa church and broke up in flames, setting fire to surrounding houses in Manta, a town of 150,000 people that is about 160 miles southwest of Quito on the Pacific coast.
A correspondent on the scene for Radio Quito said 20 bodies were in the town morgue, burned to death following the 10:40 p.m. (11:40 p.m. Ann Arbor) crash. It was feared the toll could go higher because the homes in the area of the crash are tightly grouped and made of flimsy material.
Leonardo Cedeno, head of the Manta hospital, said 20 others were being treated for various injuries.
The last major crash in Ecuador was May 4, 1995, when a private jet went down in the Andes Mountains near Quito, killing all eight aboard, including Argentine oil executive Jose Estenssoro.
In Ecuador's worst recent crash, a DC-8 cargo plane crashed in Quito on Sept. 22, 1984, killing 75 people.