Johannesburg - Rescue workers searching for victims of this
week's plane crash off the Comoros islands on Friday found what
appeared to be a door of the plane as well as a school of sharks
possibly indicating the presence of bodies, authorities said.
'They (Comoran, French and US rescue workers) found what looks to
be a door from the plane,' a spokesman at the crisis centre in the
Comoran capital Moroni confirmed.
'They also found a school of sharks around some debris. They
suppose there may be bodies there,' spokesman Ahmed Sast told the
German Press Agency dpa.
The door was found and the sharks were spotted in the same stretch
of water where the lone survivor of the Yemenia airways crash, a
12-year-old French girl of Comoran origin, was pulled from the water
on Tuesday.
So far, no bodies of the remaining 152 people on board have been
recovered.
The Comoran government has announced 30 days of mourning for the
victims.
President Ahmed Abdallah Sambi announced the mourning period in an
address Thursday on national television.
The Airbus A310 plunged into the Indian Ocean off Grande Comore
island after missing its first attempt at landing in windy weather in
the capital Moroni.
Most of the 142 passengers were Comorans living in France, where
the flight originated.
Questions over the plane's safety were raised after it emerged
France had barred the aircraft from its airspace over defects it
detected in 2007. A newer Airbus was used for the France-Yemen leg.
Yemenia insists the plane was safe.
USA
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