Crash Of Hijacked Plane Claims At Least 55 Lives

A hijacked Ethiopian airliner carrying 175 people ran out of fuel and crashed into the water Saturday just off a beach on the Comoros Islands, killing at least 55 people. Island residents risked the rough waters of the Indian Ocean to search for victims.

At least 51 people survived the Ethiopian Airlines crash on the island nation off Mozambique in east Africa, Ahmed Chanfi, deputy manager at Moroni’s international airport, told The Associated Press early today.

The Italian embassy confirmed 55 people dead and at least 16 injured. Witness reports put the death toll at more than 100.

Though rescue efforts were hindered by rough seas, the risk of shark attacks and nightfall, radio reports said islanders managed to rescue some people by floating them to shore on aircraft wreckage.

The Boeing 767 crashed around midday near the Galawa Beach Hotel, 25 miles north of the capital, Moroni, on the main island of Grande Comore.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Christopher Bush told the AP there were “several American citizens” aboard.

A military diver went into the fuselage in the early evening. “He estimated 60 to 80 passengers were still strapped in their chairs and had drowned,” hotel manager Bruce Thomson told The Associated Press.

Thomson said police and military searchers retrieved 50 bodies from the water.

Eleven hijackers commandeered Flight 961 shortly after it took off from the Ethiopian capital, Addis Abbaba, the Ethiopian News Agency reported.

The hijackers demanded the pilot take them to Australia, but didn’t believe him when he said there wasn’t enough fuel, the agency reported. The motive for the hijacking wasn’t immediately clear. The plane got as far as Moroni and tried for a crash landing.

“There was a loud noise as it hit the water. Witnesses say that it was flying very low over the water and one wing touched into the water and then the plane crashed,” hotel receptionist Natalie Bier told the BBC.

“Straight after that everybody was running and we were getting the boats out, going to try and rescue any survivors we could.”

Bier said most of the survivors they found were critically injured.

“We also recovered a lot of people who didn’t make it, who died on the boat or at the beach,” Bier said.

Thomson said survivors told him two hijackers with bombs were on the plane and a third was apparently in the hold. The explosives were never detonated, the passengers said, and the plane ran out of fuel while the pilot negotiated with the hijackers.

The wreckage was in three pieces spread across 200 yards on shore and in the water.

Another hotel worker told Radio France International that islanders floated the survivors to shore on pieces of wreckage or small boats.

“Fortunately, we had about 15 vacationing French doctors who gave a hand, who cared for those they could, right there on the beach,” he said.

The plane was destined for Abidjan in the Ivory Coast after stops in Nairobi, Kenya; Brazzaville, Congo; and Lagos, Nigeria.

The plane was carrying 163 passengers and 12 crew members, Ethiopian Airlines said.