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Plane with more than 100 people aboard crashes in Cameroon

Saturday, May 5th 2007 - 21:00 UTC
Full article

A Kenya Airways flight with more than 100 people aboard has crashed in southern Cameroon, state radio reported on Saturday.

The radio said the flight, which lost contact with airport controllers soon after taking off around midnight, crashed near the southern town of Niete. The report did not provide further details. Kenya Airways said earlier on Saturday it had lost contact with the plane shortly after takeoff. "The last message was received in Douala after takeoff and thereafter the tower was unable to contact the plane,'" Kenya Airways CEO Titus Naikuni said in the Kenyan capital. The Boeing 737-800 was carrying 106 passengers, eight crew members and a flight engineer, he said. The plane can carry 189 passengers. The flight departed Douala, Cameroon at 12:05 a.m. and was to arrive in Nairobi, the Kenyan capital, at 6:15 a.m. The flight originated in Ivory Coast but stopped in Cameroon to pick up more passengers, the airline said. The airline opened a crisis management center near the Nairobi airport. Relatives of those on the plane were instructed to go to a downtown Nairobi airport, where they would be provided information as it became available. The last crash of an international Kenya Airways flight was on Jan. 30, 2000, when Flight 431 was taking off from Abidjian, Ivory Coast, on its way to Nairobi. Investigators blamed a faulty alarm and pilot error for that crash, which killed 169 people. Kenya Airways is a partner of KLM and Air France.

Categories: Tourism, International.

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