The China Eastern Airlines Corp. plane was on its way to Guangzhou when it suddenly nosed over at cruise altitude and dove.
That’s about all that is known for certain about the unusual crash on Monday, which is thought to have killed all 132 people aboard the plane in China’s worst commercial aviation accident in more than a decade.

According to veteran crash investigators and previous accident reports, there have been a handful of crashes in which an airliner plunged from cruising altitude, but few, if any, fit the extreme profile of the Boeing Co. 737-800 as it pointed steeply toward the ground.

“It’s an unusual profile,” said John Cox, a former 737 pilot and aviation safety consultant. “It’s difficult to get the plane to do this.”

Investigators will try to determine why the jet made such an abrupt and severe dive, which sets it apart from previous accidents, as they search for the plane’s two crash-proof recorders and begin poring over clues.

They will look at the weather the plane encountered, whether the pilots made any distress calls, any hints of possible malfunctions in the wreckage, and detailed profiles of the crew.

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