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Cameroon searchers find Kenya air crash black box
16 Jun 2007 11:46:09 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Tansa Musa

YAOUNDE, June 16 (Reuters) - Air crash investigators in Cameroon have found the cockpit voice recorder from a Kenya Airways plane that plunged into swampy jungle last month killing all 114 people on board, the government said on Saturday.

The six-month old Boeing 737-800 crashed close to Douala airport shortly after taking off for Nairobi in stormy weather at around midnight on May 4-5. Much of the aircraft broke into fragments little bigger than a car door.

"The cockpit voice recorder was found on the accident site on Friday June 15," Cameroonian Transport Minister Dakole Daissala said.

"Measures are under way to take it to the Transportation Safety Board laboratory in Ottawa, Canada so it can be deciphered," he said in a statement.

Rescuers had already retrieved a first "black box", the in-flight data recorder, but the voice recorder should contain the last minutes of conversation between the pilot and co-pilot and is expected to help determine the cause of the crash.

Efforts to retrieve it had been hampered by heavy rains which constantly refilled craters emptied by rescue workers, turning the site into a quagmire.

It took nearly two days to locate the plane's wreckage after fruitless searches in tropical forest well over 100 km (60 miles) away, which Cameroonian officials have blamed on misleading information from a French satellite station.

The central African country's civil aviation chief said 10 days after the crash that the pilot had decided to take off in stormy weather while other flights waited for conditions to improve.

Kenya Airways has said it does not want to pre-empt the outcome of the investigation.

The passengers on the plane came from 27 nations, mostly African, but with others from China, India, Europe and elsewhere.
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An Indonesian military rescue team loads boxes of food which will be distributed to Morowali district, which was hit by floods and landslides, in Soroako in Indonesia's Central Sulawesi province July 27, 2007. Bad weather had hampered relief operations in the remote area where about 85 people have died and nearly 8,000 people displaced from their homes submerged by the landslides and floods up to three metres (10ft) high.



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