Report exonerates airline, pilot
Admin l Thursday, April 04, 2019
ADDIS ABBA – Ethiopian Transport Minister Dagmawit Moges has said that the pilot of “the aircraft B-737-800MAX with registration number ET-AVJ which crashed March 10, 2019 few minutes after taking off from Addis Abba enroute Kenya performed all procedures required repeatedly but could not control the plane before it crashed killing all 157 people on board.
The Ethiopian minister spoke while addressing journalists on the preliminary report on the Ethiopian Airlines ET 302 plane that crashed in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia few minutes after take off.
“The preliminary Ethiopian Airlines crash report finds that the crew “performed all procedures repeatedly provided by the manufacturer but were unable to control the aircraft,” she said, quoting Ethiopian safety investigators.
Earlier in a statement confirming the incident, the airline said, “Ethiopian Airline regrets to confirm that its flight, ET302/10 March in scheduled service from Addis Ababa to Nairobi was involved in an accident today around Bishoftu(Debre Zeit).
“The aircraft B-737-800MAX with registration number ET-AVJ took off 08:38 from Addis Ababa Bole International Airport and lost contact at 08:44 am. At this time, search and rescue are in operation, we have no confirmed information about survivors or casualties”, it said, adding that staff of the airline will be sent to the scene of the accident to assist in the operation.
This is the second involving the 737 Max 8 in the last five months. In October a Lion Air plane, same plane crashed into the sea off the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, killing all 189 people onboard.
