Ethiopia sends an investigative team after plane crushes

By Tesfa Alem Tekle

January 25, 2010 (ADDIS ABABA) — The Ethiopian airlines earlier today said that it has sent an investigative team to accident scene after its bound jet crushes at the Mediterranean sea shortly after take-off from Beirut airport.

A statement from the Ethiopian airlines said that an investigative team of 14 members has left for Beirut to join an international French company owned investigative team which is following up the incident.

The Ethiopian team was drawn from Ethiopian’s Safety and Emergency Response department, Medical Unit, Flight Operations, Maintenance and Engineering, the Ethiopian Civil Aviation and Ethiopian’s Chief Airline Security.

Emergency command center is also set up at the Ethiopian headquarters.

The Ethiopian flag carrier went missing off radar 5 minutes after takeoff with 90 people on board. The Ethiopian airlines said that 51 Lebanese, 23 Ethiopians and other passengers from different countries were aboard when the passenger jet plunged into the Mediterranean Sea. Among the 90 feared dead, 8 were plane’s crew members, it said.

The Ethiopian government declared on Monday a whole national mourning day, in the aftermaths of the morning plane crash. Flags were made lowered. The state –run Ethiopian Television (ETV) displayed telephone numbers for families of victims to contact and ask for information.

The Ethiopian Prime minister Meles Zenawi, who was outside the capital, Addis Ababa, has send messages of condolences to the families of crash victims of Ethiopian Airlines Flight 409 and promised that his government will publicize situation after investigation is over.

Cause of the plane crush isn’t yet clear but there is speculation that bad weather could be the cause that downed the plane. However some eye witnesses aired on Aljazeera TV said that the plane was on fire before it went down.

With heavy storms said hampering rescue efforts, hopes of finding people alive are said to have been fading but the bodies of over 25 people are reported to have been recovered and no sign of black box yet.

Relatives of passengers and families of the Ethiopian crew members gather at Addis Ababa Bole international airport desperately waiting to hear any possible hope.

Lebanese officials have described the Ethiopian airliner crash as a national tragedy a disaster and a catastrophe.

NO TERROR THREAT

Meanwhile, the Ethiopian government said that it wouldn’t consider terrorist act as a cause for the plane crush.

Government spokesperson, Shimeless Kemal said that Ethiopia didn’t receive any kind of threat from terrorist groups prior to the crash. Lebanese defense ministry on its side later today disclosed that its investigative team didn’t find any kind of evidence that could be linked with terrorists.

The 64-year old Ethiopian Airlines is one of Africa’s fastest growing airlines and has had a leading safety reputation. Last year it won over four international awards.

It serves 56 international destinations with 210 weekly international departures from its Addis Ababa hub and a total of 555 weekly international departures worldwide. On its website the company says that it hopes to increase revenue to one billion dollars and to increase the number of destinations it serves to 60 in 2010.

Until the latest incident the horn of Africa’s country airline had gone for over 10 years in a row keeping its safety reputation.

Two of the tragic incidents in the airline’s history date back to more than a decade. In November 1996 Ethiopian Airlines Flight 961 was hijacked between Addis Ababa and Nairobi by three Ethiopians seeking political asylum. The aircraft crashed into the Indian Ocean off the Comoros when it ran out of fuel, killing 125 of the 175 people on board.

In September 1988, one of the airline’s Boeing made a crash landing at Bahar Dar city in Ethiopia after birds hamper engine from functioning properly. Thirty one of the 105 people on board were killed.

(ST)