THAILAND: Thai authorities continue investigations after a Thai plane crash-landed on the holiday island of Phuket killing at least 89 passengers and crew

Thai authorities continue identifying victims of a Thai plane that crash-landed on the holiday island of Phuket. Meanwhile Thai relatives of passengers who were aboard the ill-fated flight search for information on their loved ones, as Thai Ministers insist domestic aviation is on par with international standards. Authorities continued the painstaking task of identifying the victims of a Thai plane crash on Monday (September 17) which left 89 passengers and crew dead. Row upon row of body bags were placed in a makeshift morgue in Phuket, the resort island where the plane carrying 130 people plunged to the earth during a crash-landing. Heavy monsoon rain has hampered the retrieval of five bodies still trapped in the wreckage of the budget airliner that crashed while trying to land at Phuket airport on Sunday night (September 16). Investigators sifted through the charred wreckage of the McDonnell Douglas MD-82 for clues on Monday. The aircraft veered off the runway, smashed into a wooded embankment and burst into flames as it tried to land during a fierce monsoon storm. Many of the surviving passengers recounted the scene when the plane landed, and how they struggled to get out of the wreckage. Twenty-three-year-old Canadian tourist Millie Furlong managed to escape through a window and is now recovering at the Bangkok Hospital in Phuket. "The flames went back and then we felt the air behind us and they kicked the window so we got up and we went out the window after a few people went out," Furlong told Reuters Television. Five survivors were in critical condition, with burns to 60 percent of their bodies, hospital officials said. Fourteen Thais, eight Britons, five Iranians and four Germans were among those injured. So far, the only foreigner confirmed dead in the crash is French. There has been no word on other nationalities, although in a country that welcomes more than 12 million tourists a year, they are likely to be from every corner of the globe. The Indonesian captain and his Thai co-pilot were both killed, but 42 people survived a crash likely to raise more safety questions about the dozens of budget carriers that have sprung up across Asia in the last decade. Relatives were still unaware of whether the carrier, airline One-Two-Go, would provide them with any compensation. "I don't know about compensation. We are waiting to hear how One-Two-Go will help us," said, Thanachai Chaisangtao, the brother-in-law of a British passenger who died on the doomed flight. Visiting relatives of passengers at Bangkok airport, Thai Prime Minister Surayud Chulanot, told media that Thailand's domestic airlines were on par with international carries and that all safety standards are strictly imposed. Chulanot said Thailand was fully capable of dealing with the investigation and sought to put relatives' minds at ease, saying Thailand would offer quality medical care to survivors. "The government is fully responsible to handle the identification of the deaths, remove the wreckage from the runway, reopen the airport and take the best care of the injured passengers," Chulanot said. Hounded by journalists as to whether he felt poor Thai aviation standards could have been the cause of the fatal crash, he simply said: "We have international aviation standards for planes and pilots." "Yes, I reaffirm that we have international standards in every aspect of aviation," he added. Emergency workers were quick to retrieve the "black box" flight data recorder. Much of the crash investigation is likely to focus on the weather as the plane, flown by Bangkok-based low-cost operator One-Two-Go, was coming in to land. The Bangkok Post newspaper quoted a senior aviation official as saying the pilot told the control tower he was aborting the landing because he could not see the runway. Survivors spoke of torrential rain and trees bent over in the wind. Udom Tantiprasongchai, chairman of One-Two-Go parent company Orient Thai Airlines, said the pilot was experienced. All flights to the island have been cancelled as the investigation into why the plane landed, gets underway. One British woman, Kate Geraghty, who lives and works in Phuket, was trapped in Bangkok, unable to get on a flight, but said she was hopeful flights back to the island would be resumed later on Monday. "My flight was cancelled, so I've had to come back today to fly back to Phuket, so hopefully the airport will be open later today," she said. Despite a number of crashes and scares, most recently in Indonesia, analysts say there is no hard evidence to suggest budget carriers are more accident-prone than their full-service competitors.

ITN Source | September 17, 2007

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