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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Ethiopian airliner explodes? and crashes on takeoff in Lebanon |
| 2010-01-25 |
| Filed under non-WOT for the time being. AN Ethiopian airliner carrying 92 passengers and crew crashed in stormy weather following takeoff in Lebanon early today, plunging into the Mediterranean sea. "Ethiopian Airline Flight 409 crashed about five minutes after takeoff at 2.30am (local time) with 83 passengers and nine crew members," the airport official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. He said witnesses saw a ball of fire as the jet plunged into the sea. The official said rescuers were trying to reach the plane to see if there were any survivors. |
| Posted by:phil_b |
| #6 "hopes of finding any survivors faded 12 hours after the crash" If the plane broke up while still in the air, hopes of finding any survivors faded a whole lot sooner that that. |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2010-01-25 22:21 |
| #5 Must be using some ValuJet oxygen canisters. Decent point. Maybe there was something strange in cargo. Maybe the maintenance was poor. Aircraft falling from the sky in flames isn't a common result of mechanical casualty. Consider: Friday, the UK raised its terror threat level to "severe," which, according to the Home Secretary, means "This means that a terrorist attack is highly likely, but I should stress that there is no intelligence to suggest that an attack is imminent," whatever that means. Osama bin Laden released a tape to al Jazeera on 24 Jan, in which he claimed responsibility for the failed Christmas bombing. In that tape he used specific phrasing that indicated an upcoming attack, according to SITE. The Mirror reports that "Anti-terror officials said the past week had seen an "unusually high" number of people on their no-fly list trying to board US-bound planes." Specifically, the Mirror story mentions two men who tried to board at Heathrow over this past weekend. All of this in a space of 72 hours. |
| Posted by: Pstanley 2010-01-25 14:01 |
| #4 Must be using some ValuJet oxygen canisters. |
| Posted by: Gletch Sforza1379 2010-01-25 09:38 |
| #3 French AMBO's wife was on board. French ambassador's wife found dead at Lebanon air crash site |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2010-01-25 09:35 |
| #2 The story on Yahoo World News includes the following quote, not mentioned in this article. The Lebanese army said the plane had broken up in the air before plummeting into rough seas and hopes of finding any survivors faded 12 hours after the crash. Witnesses described the impact as a "flash that lit up the whole sea" and a "ball of fire." Lebanese President Michel Suleiman said he did not think the plane had been brought down deliberately, emphasizing "a sabotage attack is unlikely." Broke up in air. Big ball of fire. Accident, maybe not. |
| Posted by: Swanimote 2010-01-25 09:04 |
| #1 One of al Shabaab's primary targets is Ethiopia. I'm sure various government will shortly unleash a riot of reasons that this couldn't possibly be terrorism. Experts will be called in, and in a year's time a never-before-recorded-in-the-history-of-aviation mechanical failure will be revealed as the cause. |
| Posted by: Pstanley 2010-01-25 01:01 |