GOMA, DR Congo (AFP) — A passenger plane that ploughed into a market in an eastern Democratic Republic of Congo town killed 40 people, the provincial governor said on Wednesday, as rescue workers scoured the debris.
"The toll from this accident is now 40 dead and 111 injured," said Nord-Kivu's governor, Julien Paluku.
He was speaking after visits to hospitals and clinics in Goma, capital of the eastern province.
More than 100 injured people, for the most part residents of the Birere shanty town, were being treated in three Goma hospitals. Some of the patients had suffered severe burns from the blazing aircraft.
The black box flight recorder from the DC-9 plane had been recovered at Tuesday's crash site in Goma's Birere district, Paluku added. The crash site lies at the end of the runway where the pilot had tried to take off.
Normally bustling trade in Birere was halted Wednesday.
The speaker of the DRC's National Assembly, Vital Kamerhe, left the capital Kinshasa for Goma in the morning, heading a delegation of government ministers and lawmakers set up after the crash.
President Joseph Kabila has ordered a probe into the fifth fatal plane crash in the DRC since last June. Most of the others have involved aging Soviet-era aircraft.
The cause of the accident remained unclear, but aviation sources said it appeared that the plane had developed engine trouble, skidded on water on the runway and the pilot had lost control.
A member of the government team sent to Goma said it had been asked to give "necessary aid" from the government to hospitals and to attend the funerals of the dead.
Police cordoned off the crash site where parts of the plane and rubble were still smouldering and UN fire crews were at work, while municipal workers were searching the rubble of homes for bodies.
Alan Doss, head of MONUC, the UN peacekeeping mission in DRC, said in New York he was shocked at the news, and promised full support and that of his agency to the DRC authorities.
Some residents gathered at hospitals, seeking news, while local chiefs were asked to collect the names of Birere people known to be missing.
Stavros Papaioannou of Hewa Bora Airlines, which chartered the DC-9, told of the problems during the take-off for Kinshasa, the capital. He said the crew had heard an explosion in the rear as the plane built up speed.
"It needed to reach 126 knots to take off," the Hewa Bora chief said. "The pilot braked, but the runway was wet, the aircraft skidded and he lost control."
Papaioannou said there were 79 passengers and six crew on board. He said the crew and 53 passengers had been accounted for, adding that "there were seven expatriates on board, including four Americans, none of whom was killed."
Bodies were still trapped Wednesday under mangled and burning metal, an AFP photographer said, and the stench was overpowering. The plane was ripped apart in the violence of the crash, leaving only its nose visible in the debris.
In the morning, Red Cross workers were collecting rainwater from potholes.
Potholes are part of the problem on the runway at Goma airport, which was damaged by lava during a 2002 eruption of a nearby volcano. It is currently in disrepair with broken tarmac all over.
The lava flow had reduced the runway by a third and aviation officials said planes now had to make short takeoffs.
Passenger Desire Buhendwa, a 36-year-old Congolese computer engineer, told AFP in Goma general hospital: "There were flames coming from the left wing. There was panic in the plane. I ran to the front. Crew members opened a door and I jumped. I fell onto the ground and saw the plane continue to move forward, then catch fire."
A woman survivor hospitalised in Goma's Heal Africa clinic, praised the pilot, saying he had opened all the emergency exits just after the crash, thereby saving many lives.
Two wards in the Heal Africa hospital were full, with 56 survivors, including 31 passengers, being treated with burn injuries and broken limbs.
It was the fifth fatal plane crash in DR Congo since June last year. In October an Antonov cargo aircraft ploughed into a working class district of Kinshasa, killing at least 50 people.
All the country's airlines, around 50, have been banned by the European Union from flying in their airspace.
Philippe Lecreux, a French businessman based in the region who gave up flying Hewa Bora for safety reasons, said this was an accident waiting to happen, "...a logical consequence of a chain of collective aviation failings in DRC."
"Hewa Bora does not respect any safety rules," he told AFP. "This catastrophe was predictable and had to happen."
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