Omer Redi Ahmed, AfricaNews reporter in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
About 60 of the 90 people onboard Ethiopian Airlines plane that crashed into Mediterranean Sea are confirmed dead, according to Ethiopia's Government Communication Affairs Office (GCAO). Ethiopian government declared January 25 a national day of mourning.
In what Ethiopian aviation authorities claim to be a rare incident in the history of the Airlines, Flight ET409 with 82 passengers and 8 all-Ethiopian crew members on board crashed in Mediterranean Sea early Monday morning few minutes after it took off from Rafik Hariry International Airport in Beirut.
The incident has come less than two months after the Airline was honoured with the “Airline of the Year Award” by the African Airlines Association (AFRAA), “in recognition of its outstanding, efficient and exemplary provision of Airline Service”.
Sources at Ethiopian said that the most probable cause of the crash is terrorist attack though government and aviation authorities say the cause is not yet established.
“Investigation is still going on about the cause of the crush and hence we cannot confirm it is a terrorist attack. But about 60 bodies, all dead, have been found in the Sea and they are in hospital. Their nationalities and identity will be released as soon as we identify them,” Bereket Simon, Head of GCAO said.
But the BBC quoted witnesses in the area as saying that they have seen parts of the aircraft going down to sea while on fire.
Forces from the UN Interim Mission in Lebanon and Lebanese army and navy are involved in the rescue operation under the rescue team led by Lebanese Minister of Transport, according to Girma Wake, CEO of Ethiopian.
Ethiopian has also contracted rescue professionals from London and “they will be flying to Beirut this afternoon to join the rescue team”. A 14- member Ethiopian team comprising of aviation authorities and airline management, intelligence service as well as medical personnel has already arrived in Libya, according to the latest information from GCAO.
The Boeing 737-800 aircraft departed Beirut at 2:35am and few minutes after it was out of radar and lost every connection with Lebanese aviation authorities, according to Girma.
There were 82 passengers and 8 Ethiopian Crewmembers onboard the crashed aircraft. Of the passengers 23 are Ethiopians, 51 Lebanese, 2 British and the remaining 6 each from France, Turkey, Russia, Canada, Syria and Iraq.
The Boeing 737-800 aircraft was leased from CIT Aerospace, a New York based private company.
Families of the Ethiopian passengers have gathered at the Addis Airport. Girma said the Airlines has organized the families and deployed a team to comfort them till they hear about the status of their families.
Unconfirmed reports indicate that one of the passengers was the wife of French Ambassador to Lebanon.
“What I can confirm is that there were 52 male and 30 female passengers on that Aircraft and the (French) Ambassador’s wife could be one of them,” Girma said in a press conference at Ethiopian Headquarters following the incident.
Though Girma said that there was bad weather at departure, he stated that the cause of the crash is yet to be identified.
“There was bad weather but how bad it was, I don’t know. If it was too bad the crew would not have departed in the first place,” he told reporters.
Ethiopian has a reputation of safety with rare incidents. In 1988 birds entered the engine of a taking off aircraft at Bahirdar Airport, one of the regional airports in Ethiopia, which caused a crash. In 1996 a hijacked airplane from Addis Ababa run out of fuel and while trying to land in Comoros, it short-landed in Indian Ocean in a remarkable landing that helped save some passengers.
“Crashes due to technical failures and crew defect are non-existent in the history of Ethiopian Airlines,” Girma said.
The 737-800 flew from Addis Ababa to Beirut on Sunday on a daily regular flight operation and has no indication of defect both in Addis and Beirut airports.
The last time it went through the regular maintenance and check-up was December 25, 2009.
The aircraft was manufactured in 2000 and entered operations with Ethiopian in September 2009.
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