Cathay investigates after crew oxygen bottles were found empty

BEIJING - Hong Kong's Cathay Pacific Airways on Tuesday said it had launched an investigation after a dozen oxygen bottles used by cabin crew in emergencies were found empty, or partially empty, on 2 of its aircraft.

The discovery was made on the ground in routine inspections before a departure from Toronto, the carrier said, adding that of the 22 bottles carried onboard each jet, 5 were affected on one aircraft and 8 on the other.

"The portable oxygen bottles are for operational cabin crew use and permit crew to move around the cabin in the unlikely event of emergency aircraft depressurization," Cathay said in a statement.

"Both cabin crew and passengers have in-seat aircraft oxygen available at all times."

The airline said the depleted bottles were refilled and checked by engineers prior to departure.

The incident, which comes as the airline is under scrutiny from China's aviation regulator, caused a stir on Chinese social media, with many commentators accusing the airline of endangering flight safety.

Cathay has emerged as the highest-profile corporate target as Beijing looks to quell protests in Hong Kong, with the Chinese government demanding it suspend staff involved in a protest movement, citing flight safety concerns.

Pilots and cabin crew have described a "white terror" of political denunciations, sackings and phone searches by Chinese aviation officials.

The carrier's chief executive, Rupert Hogg, stepped down this month, and his replacement, Augustus Tang, told staff one of his priorities was to focus on safety and security. 

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F-35 fighter jet program 'plagued' by troubles, US senator tells Pentagon

WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley asked newly confirmed Defense Secretary Mark Esper on Thursday about cost overruns and technical issues that have "plagued" the Pentagon's high-priced F-35 fighter jet program.

The Department of Defense failed to keep adequate records on the program's costs and installed parts that were not ready for use, according to reports from the Pentagon's inspector general in March and June.

These shortfalls, Grassley said in a letter to Esper, have resulted in "financial waste and further delays to the mission readiness" of the plane and have "potentially jeopardized the lives" of pilots who fly the F-35.

The Pentagon's Joint Program Office, which manages the F-35 program, did not immediately respond to request for comment.

Lockheed Martin Corp, the lead contractor for the program, said in a statement that it "looks forward to partnering with" the Joint Program Office as the Pentagon adjusts procedures to address the reports.

Lockheed also said it manages all government property records in accordance with its contracts.

The Lockheed parts installed by the Pentagon were not ready for installation because they lacked electronic records, the inspector general said in June. Defense Department employees instead turned to keeping manual records, the June report said.

Installing the parts inflated the flying time of "mission-ready" planes, and in turn inflated the incentive fees paid to Lockheed by the Defense Department for mission-ready flying hours, the June report said.

The Joint Program Office knew about the issue, but "did not take adequate steps" to resolve it, Grassley said, citing the June report.

An earlier report in March found the Pentagon "does not know the actual value" of government-purchased F-35 property because it failed to keep an independent record, leaving Lockheed and its subcontractor with the only record of the property, which Lockheed valued at $2.1 billion.

The Department of Defense has no mechanism to verify Lockheed's record, the March report said.

As long as these issues remain, they will "continue hemorrhaging money" from the program and threaten the planes' readiness and safety, Grassley noted.

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Boeing 737 goes into Florida river with 136 on board, no fatalities

A Boeing 737 commercial jet with 136 people on board slid into the St. John's River near Jacksonville, Florida after landing on Friday, a spokesperson for Naval Air Station Jacksonville said.

The mayor of Jacksonville said on Twitter that everyone on board the flight was "alive and accounted for" but that crews were working to control jet fuel on the water.

"The plane was not submerged. Every person is alive and accounted for," the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office said on Twitter.

The flight was arriving from Cuba, the spokesperson said.

No further details were immediately available. 

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Plane stranded at Naia to be lifted by crane - aviation officials

MANILA – Philippine aviation authorities on Friday said the stranded Xiamen Air plane that crash-landed at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) before midnight Thursday will be lifted by crane. 

Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) General Manager Ed Monreal said in a press briefing that pulling the plane out of NAIA's runway 06/24 is no longer viable since its nose wheel and a part of its landing gear had collapsed. 

"Nag-collapse 'yung nose wheel, nag-collapse yung isang parte ng landing gear wala ho tayo mapagkakabitan (The nose wheel collapsed, a part of the landing gear collapsed, we have nothing to latch on to)," Monreal said. 

He said the government will lease a telescopic crane from a hotel in Manila that has capability for such heavy lifting. The hotel, which offers "dinner in the sky," uses such heavy machinery to lift an entire makeshift restaurant. 

"'Yun ang aming tinap. Mabuti na lang at available at malapit. 'Yun po ang aming final decision na gagawin, tatalian sa ilalim, may strap, bubuhatin ng buo ang eroplano, ilalagay sa flatbed at ilipat na ho," he said. 

(That's what we tapped. It's a good thing it's available and close by. That's our final decision. We will tie a strap around the plane and lift it entirely, put it on a flatbed and then we move it.)

When asked how much it would cost government to rent the crane, Monreal said such concern was secondary.

"Ang importante ho mabuksan natin ang paliparan para gamitin ng mga pasahero. It may be too expensive but we have to bite the bullet. Isantabi muna natin ang cost, ang mahalaga mabigyan natin ng serbisyo publiko ang mananakay," Monreal said. 

(What's important is that we open the runway for the passengers... Set aside the costs, what's important is that we serve the riding public.)

Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines deputy director for operations Capt. Donaldo Mendoza said a Chinese counterpart is expected to arrive in the country late Friday.

Monreal said runway 06/24 will remain closed until 7 p.m. It is NAIA's longer runway used by bigger commercial aircraft.

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Boeing gets $3.9 billion contract for new Air Force One jets

WASHINGTON -- Boeing Co has received a $3.9 billion contract to build two 747-8 aircraft for use as Air Force One by the US president, due to be delivered by December 2024 and painted red, white and blue, officials said on Tuesday.

The Pentagon announced the decision on Tuesday, saying Seattle-based Boeing's previously awarded contract for development work had been expanded to include design, modification and fielding of two mission-ready presidential 747-8 aircraft.

The contract followed the outlines of the informal deal reached between Boeing and the White House in February. That agreement came after President Donald Trump objected to the $4 billion price tag of a previous Air Force One deal, complaining in a Twitter post that "costs are out of control" and adding "Cancel order!"

The White House said in February the new deal would save taxpayers more than $1.4 billion, but those savings could not be independently confirmed.

Air Force budget documents released in February for fiscal year 2019 disclosed a $3.9 billion cost for the two-aircraft program. The same 2018 budget document, not adjusted for inflation, showed the price at $3.6 billion.

The Boeing 747-8s are designed to be an airborne White House able to fly in worst-case security scenarios, such as nuclear war, and are modified with military avionics, advanced communications and a self-defense system.

A congressional official briefed on Tuesday about the deal indicated it was little changed from the informal agreement reached in February, calling for two 747-8 aircraft to be built for $3.9 billion and delivered by December 2024.

Trump told CBS in an interview that aired on Tuesday that the new model Air Force One would be updated on the inside and have a different exterior color scheme from the current white and two shades of blue dating back to President John F. Kennedy's administration.

"Red, white and blue," Trump said. "Air Force One is going to be incredible. It's going to be the top of the line, the top in the world. And it's going to be red, white and blue, which I think is appropriate."

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LOOK: Cebu Pacific plane overshoots Iloilo runway

A Cebu Pacific aircraft carrying 180 passengers overshot the runway of the Iloilo International Airport late Friday night.

The airline, in a statement, said an incident involving Flight 5J 461 occurred upon landing at the airport at 11:15 p.m. The plane came from Manila.

"The crew initiated emergency evacuation. All passengers are accounted for and are safe. They are being attended to by airport personnel," the statement added.


It did not give additional details.

One of the passengers, Loui Latoza, gave permission to ABS-CBN News to use photos of aircraft after the incident.

The images show emergency personnel and cabin crew helping passengers alight from the aircraft.

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China drone king DJI turns to farming

SHENZEN, China - China drone-maker DJI is betting on flying machines that shoot pesticide instead of photos to fend off growing competition in the global remote-controlled aircraft market.

The world leader in the civilian drones sector is switching its focus from leisure photography to more professional uses for its unmanned aerial vehicles, and it sees agriculture as the future for the burgeoning industry.

DJI's campus lies within the High Tech Park of the southern city of Shenzhen, China's Silicon Valley, where visitors are treated to a showroom featuring an array of drones.

Half the space of the showroom is dedicated to the recreational machines like the Phantom series, while the other half shows off the "enterprise" drones for agriculture, public safety, professional photography or film-making.

Propelled by rotors, the tiny crop dusting aircraft can carry a liquid payload of 15 kilograms (33 pounds) to spray fields.

Piloted from a distance, one drone can cover the same surface as around 30 people and it does the job more efficiently, said Jiang Sanchun, manager of a small company that operates pesticide drones for farmers in northern China.

"Within five years, we went from drones that only took photos to machines specialized in first aid or agriculture," DJI vice president Paul Xu told AFP at the company's headquarters in Shenzhen.

FIGHTING FIRES

DJI was founded in 2006 in an apartment in Shenzhen by Frank Wang, a young graduate with a passion for model planes.

The company now makes almost two-thirds of the world's civilian drones, according to an estimate by Frost & Sullivan, a market research company.

Its overall revenues reached $1.5 billion last year.

Xu boasted that DJI "created a new market" in 2013 when it launched its Phantom drone with high-definition cameras.

Some 75 percent of its drones are sold abroad, mostly in the United States and Europe, and they are popular among people flying the crafts for fun or to take aerial photos.

A drone that landed on the White House lawn in 2015 was a DJI Phantom.

US authorities issued news rules last year that clear the way for small, commercial drones to operate across American airspace, while European Union regulators are trying to catch up.

With competition on the rise, DJI is looking for new markets.

In late 2015, it launched Agras MG-1, an octocopter, or eight-rotor drone, which can carry pesticide or fertilizer.

"A drone can monitor energy networks in hard to reach areas or support public security missions," Xu said.

Chinese police use thermal cameras to track down fugitives. In Brazil and California, firefighters use them to get a complete, bird's eye view of a blaze. Zoom lenses can help authorities locate people in rescue missions in remote areas.

"DJI is entering these enterprise markets because that is where their customer base takes them," said Susan Eustis, president of US-based firm WinterGreen Research.

Worldwide drone sales soared by 60 percent last year, according to the Gartner consulting company. Sales are expected to reach $6 billion this year and nearly double to 11.2 billion by 2020.

Drones for commercial uses represent six percent of the market, but a whopping 60 percent of revenue.

"We do see the DJI market domination as likely to continue for the next five years with no serious challengers," Eustis said, noting that the company has the ability to roll out new products within months.

NOT A WINNER

But the Chinese firm is far from dominating the enterprise drone market.

While DJI commands half the general market in small drone sales in North America, its share falls dramatically for the higher priced machines.

In the battle for drones costing more than $7,500, DJI has a 33 percent market share in North America, said Colin Snow, chief executive of Skylogic Research, a consultancy in the drone market.

Snow, writing in a research note, said DJI's strategy of transforming existing products to fit the enterprise market "is not a winner", noting that brands like Lockheed Martin are better known among companies.

But with a quarter of DJI's 8,000-staff dedicated to research, Xu said the company was capable of producing "the necessary cocktail of complex technologies".

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China-built amphibious aircraft takes maiden flight: Xinhua

China's domestically developed AG600, the world's largest amphibious aircraft, took its maiden flight ahead of schedule on Saturday from the southern city of Zhuhai, according to the official Xinhua news agency.

The AG600 was designed to extinguish forest fires and carry out rescue missions at sea, Xinhua said on Saturday, adding that it could also "be used to monitor and protect the ocean."

The seaplane's maiden flight comes amid China's increasing assertiveness to its territorial claims in the disputed South China Sea where it is building airfields and deploying military equipment, rattling nerves in the Asia-Pacific region and the United States.

China is in the midst of a massive military modernization program, ranging from testing anti-satellite missiles to building stealth fighters and the country's first indigenous aircraft carrier, to add to an existing one bought from Ukraine.

Xinhua initially reported in March that the AG600 would take its maiden flight in late May.

(Reporting by Sue-Lin Wong; Editing by Ros Russell)

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World's 'largest aircraft' gets off ground

LONDON - The world's ''largest aircraft'' embarked on its maiden flight on Wednesday, four days after a previous attempt was abandoned due to technical issues.

The Airlander 10 -- part plane, part airship -- took to the skies amid cheers and applause from crowds gathered at an airfield in Cardington, central England.

The successful flight comes 85 years after another airship -- the ill-fated R101 -- took off from the same airfield in October 1930 before crashing in France, killing 48 people and effectively ending the development of airships in Britain.

Originally developed for the US army as a surveillance aircraft, the 92-metre- (302 feet-) long Airlander 10, also has potential uses in the commercial sector, such as carrying cargo, according to makers Hybrid Air Vehicles (HAV).

The firm, which describes the Airlander as the "largest aircraft currently flying", received a British government grant of 2.5 million pounds ($3.7 million, 2.9 million euros to develop the project.

The Airlander can fly at up to 4,880 meters (6,000 feet) and reach speeds of 148 kilometers per hour (92 miles per hour), according to HAV.

Filled with helium, it can stay airborne for more than two weeks unmanned and up to five days if manned.

Its first flight was delayed on Sunday due to a technical fault, which was resolved in time for the aircraft to take off in clear weather conditions for Wednesday's 30-minute flight.

HAV CEO Stephen McGlennan said the aircraft was cheaper and greener than helicopter technology.

"It's a great British innovation. It's a combination of an aircraft that has parts of normal fixed wing aircraft, it's got helicopter, it's got airship," he said.

A project to develop the aircraft for surveillance use by the US military was shelved due to budget cuts.

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India clears $4.74 billion defense purchase

NEW DELHI - India's defense ministry has cleared the purchase of military equipment worth $4.74 billion, including four long-range patrol aircraft from US aerospace giant Boeing, an official said Wednesday.

The Defense Acquisition Council, which approves big-ticket purchases, also approved an order for 428 air defence artillery guns during a meeting late Tuesday, the official said.

"The council has cleared proposals relating mainly to purchase of air defense guns and long-range patrol aircraft for the navy," the official said on condition of anonymity.

India last year lifted a cap on foreign investment in defense as the government seeks to revamp its ageing military equipment.

The right-wing government that came to power last year also wants to boost local manufacturing and end the country's status as the world's largest arms importer.

Military purchases had stalled under the previous Congress government, slowing down much-needed investment in the high-profile sector.

The order for four new planes from Boeing follows an earlier deal to buy eight P-8I aircraft from the company in 2009. India has already received seven P-8Is with the eighth expected later this year.

The United States displaced traditional ally Russia as India's top supplier of armaments in 2013 and Washington and New Delhi renewed their 10-year Defense Framework Agreement during President Barack Obama's visit in January.

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Taiwan pilot shut off engine before air crash, report says

TAIPEI -- The pilot of a passenger plane that crashed into a river in Taiwan killing 43 people shut down the plane's only working engine after the other failed, a new report confirmed Thursday.

TransAsia Airways Flight GE235 plunged shortly after take-off from Taipei's Songshan airport in February with 53 passengers and five crew on board. Only 15 people survived.

Seconds before the crash the pilot said: "Wow, pulled back wrong throttle" the report from Taiwan's Aviation Safety Council revealed, from words recorded on a black box.

That led the plane's one working engine to fail after the other had already lost power, investigators said.

Dramatic car dashcam images showed the plane hitting an elevated road as it banked steeply away from buildings before crashing into the Keeling River.

Initial reports from the black boxes found the plane's right engine had "flamed out" about two minutes after take-off while the left engine was then shut down manually by the crew for unknown reasons.

Thursday's report confirmed that one engine had failed and was no longer delivering power to the aircraft.

One of the three pilots in the cockpit then pulled back the throttle of the other engine, the report said, causing it to also lose power.

Investigators said that with both engines shut off the plane began a descent and was unable to recover.

"Why the pilot did this, we don't know. That's the main task for our (final) analysis report," said Thomas Wang, head of the aviation body.

The draft of that report is due out in November with the final report expected in April 2016.

Thursday's evidence was described as a "factual report" giving more detail about the crash, but not attributing responsibility or drawing final conclusions about the cause.

Taiwan's aviation regulator ordered TransAsia pilots to take an oral test on basic operating and emergency procedures for the French-made aircraft after the initial findings pointed to pilot error.

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Coming soon: Star Wars-themed planes

MIAMI - All Nippon Airways Co. may fly at least two Star Wars-themed planes on international routes, instead of the previously announced one, ANA President Osamu Shinobe said Sunday.

A Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner aircraft painted like popular robot character R2-D2 and carrying the Star Wars logo will begin operating this fall. The possible additional Star Wars-themed plane may feature a character other than R2-D2, he said.

"The project has gained great feedback. We may increase the number of planes if it proves popular," Shinobe said in an interview with Kyodo News in Miami.

The ANA president also said among the candidate routes for the R2-D2 jet are ones linking Tokyo's Haneda airport and Jakarta, and Haneda and Munich, Germany.

ANA will fly the aircraft to start its five-year Star Wars project leading up to 2020.

The new movie, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, will be released in December.

==Kyodo

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Honda unveils first business jet

TOKYO, Japan - Honda on Thursday unveiled its first private jet before it hits the market this summer, as the Japanese giant, better known for making cars, targets deep-pocketed business flyers.

Nearly 20 years in the making, the red and white seven-seater HondaJet, about 13 metres (42 feet) long, is designed to face less air resistance because its engines sit atop the wings instead of the rear of the fuselage.

The curtain raising event at Tokyo's downtown Haneda airport comes as the jet embarks on a world tour totalling 48,000 kilometres (about 30,000 miles), which will take it to more than a dozen countries, including Switzerland, Britain, France and Germany.

HondaJet, developed by the automaker's US-based subsidiary Honda Aircraft Company, has a $4.5 million price tag and is aimed at wealthy individuals looking to criss-cross continents in privacy.

The company said it currently has more than 100 orders for the business jet, which can travel 2,000 kilometres without refuelling.

That could see it travel between Los Angeles and Denver or London and Rome at speeds of up to 778 kilometres (483 miles) per hour, faster than rival offerings, Honda said.

President Takanobu Ito said the aircraft would "create a new standard of performance and comfort for small-sized business jets".

He added that developing a jet was the long-time ambition of the auto and motorcycle maker's now-deceased founder Soichiro Honda.

"Honda has pursued this dream to take to the skies since the time of the company's launch," Ito said.

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Korea orders inspection of Asiana A320 pilots after plane skids off runway

SEOUL - South Korean authorities said on Wednesday they planned an "urgent competence inspection" of Asiana Airlines pilots flying Airbus A320 planes, the day after one of the planes skidded off a runway in Japan.

South Korea's Yonhap news agency said the measures would affect 489 pilots, 370 of them with Asiana and the remainder with its low-cost subsidiary, Air Busan. The two airlines are the only operators of the A320 based in South Korea.

The Transport Ministry also said that it had ordered eight South Korean airlines to ensure close safety management.

The Asiana flight hit a 6-meter tall transmission device ahead of the runway as it landed on Tuesday night in the Japanese city of Hiroshima, Yonhap reported. The plane skidded off the runway.

Asiana said 18 of the 73 passengers had suffered minor injuries.

Nearly two years ago, an Asiana Boeing 777 crashed at San Francisco's main airport when its tail struck a sea wall short of the runway, killing three people and injuring more than 180. The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board cited "mismanagement" by pilots as the probable cause.

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Want to attend flight school? Here's what to expect

BINALONAN, PANGASINAN – “Everyone can fly, ‘plane’ and simple” – this is the tagline of an aviation school in Binalonan, Pangasinan, an area dubbed as the country’s next “university town” for its growing number of educational institutions.

Founded by Binalonan Mayor Ramon Guico III – who is also a licensed pilot and instructor – WCC Aeronautical and Technological College (www.wccaviation.com) has produced over 500 commercial pilots with its fleet of 30 aircraft, a functioning airport facility, a control tower, two flight simulators and an 850-meter airstrip, among others.

The aviation school also offers a resort-type hotel for its students who are either taking the two-year course or the shorter “fast-track” program.

“In more than seven years of educating aviation professionals, we have produced more than 500 commercial pilots. It also goes for our flight attendants and aircraft mechanics who are now actively working in airlines,” Guico said. “We now have a big influx of students from all over Asia who come to the Philippines to learn about aviation.”

Learning how to fly will cost over P1 million, but the returns are promising. Guico said their graduates have scored jobs in top airlines in different parts of the world. The average monthly salary of a captain pilot at a reputable airline, one instructor at WCC Aviation noted, is from P300,000 to P500,000.

But don’t expect to fly on the first few sessions – students need to go through a series of lectures and simulations before they get to operate a real plane.

Click next to see a glimpse of WCC Aviation’s facilities as well as clips of flying over Pangasinan using two-seater and four-seater aircraft.

View this slideshow in Desktop site.

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Why AirAsia has little margin for error in crisis over missing jet

KUALA LUMPUR/SINGAPORE - As AirAsia Bhd grapples with its first airliner disaster since its founding a dozen years ago, Asia's biggest budget carrier will have little margin for error given tough competition and thin profits in the sector.

Even before an Indonesia AirAsia flight went missing on Sunday night with 162 on board, presumed to have crashed off the Indonesian coast, affiliates in Thailand and the Philippines as well as its long-haul unit were posting losses while its Indonesian unit eked out only a tiny profit in the latest quarter.

Several analysts believe the incident could deter some passengers from using the airline, at least in the short term, with an outsized impact on its bottom line.

"Given the thin margin nature of the airline business, our calculations suggest that a 1 percent decline in IAA (Indonesia AirAsia), Malaysia AirAsia and Thai AirAsia's 2015 passenger traffic will result in a 13 percent reduction to AirAsia's 2015 net profit," CIMB analysts Raymond Yap and Jian Bo Gan said in a report.

The group is locked in fierce competition with regional rivals such as Malaysian Airline System Bhd, Qantas unit Jetstar, Indonesia's Lion Air and subsidiaries of Singapore Airlines.

With the AirAsia livery displayed prominently on the missing aircraft, the CIMB analysts expected the AirAsia group's Malaysian and Thai carriers would also be affected by the incident.

"But unless there is a second incident in the very near future, the AirAsia group's strong safety track record and very attractive commercial offerings may help limit the contagion and ensure a speedier demand recovery," they added.

Both the Indonesian and Malaysian aviation sectors have come under scrutiny after a series of accidents which have spooked air travellers and spurred action by safety authorities.

Indonesia said it would review the Indonesian operations of AirAsia to improve safety. Indonesia AirAsia is 49 percent owned by AirAsia, with local investors holding the rest.

SHARES FALL

Investors concerned about the incident's impact sold shares of the company and its affiliates on Monday, with AirAsia ending down 8.5 percent at its lowest close in a month on volume of 103 million shares, 10 times the average volume. During the session the shares had fallen as much as 12.9 percent.

Still, they are up 22 percent for the year so far, compared with a 5 percent fall in the Kuala Lumpur benchmark index.

Shares in Asia Aviation PCL, the holding company for Thai AirAsia in which the AirAsia group owns 45 percent, fell 2.3 percent on Monday.

Analysts believe the incident could prevent the airline from keeping up its yields, or average revenue per passenger for every kilometre flown.

"I was expecting yields to at least maintain on a year-on-year basis in 2015, but now I'm expecting them to decline by up to five percent," said Daniel Wong, analyst at Kuala Lumpur-based Hong Leong Investment Bank. He downgraded his rating on AirAsia to a "trading sell" from a "buy".

The direct impact on AirAsia from the Indonesia unit will be limited, analysts said, because even before the accident the unit was not contributing to AirAsia's bottom line and had not been expected do so for at least several quarters, as it makes up for unrecognised losses.

AirAsia Bhd's third-quarter profit tumbled 85 percent in July-September on rising costs, while affiliated long-haul carrier AirAsia X reported a fourth consecutive quarterly loss.

AirAsia also has a venture in India that launched flights in June and aims to expand. In July, it announced plans for a low-cost airline with Japan's biggest online retailer, Rakuten and other companies, marking its second attempt to tap the Japan market.

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Bad weather likely cause of Air Algerie crash - French officials

PARIS - Poor weather was the most likely cause of the crash of an Air Algerie flight over the West African state of Mali with 116 people on board, French officials said on Friday.

Investigators at the scene of the crash had concluded the airliner broke apart when it hit the ground, the officials said, suggesting this meant it was unlikely to have been the victim of an attack.

"The aircraft was destroyed at the moment it crashed," Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve told RTL radio of the wreckage of the plane carrying 51 French nationals which crashed in Mali near the border with Burkina Faso on Thursday.

"We think the aircraft crashed for reasons linked to the weather conditions. No theory can be excluded at this point ... but that is indeed the most likely theory," he added.

Separately, Transport Minister Frederic Cuvillier said the strong smell of aircraft fuel at the crash site and the fact that the debris was scattered over a relatively small area also suggested the cause of the crash was linked to weather, a technical problem or a cumulation of such factors.

"We exclude - and have done so from the start - any ground strike," Cuvillier told France 2 television.

He added that a column of 100 soldiers from the French force stationed in the region were on their way to secure the crash site near the northern town of Gossi. France deployed troops to Mail last year to halt an al Qaeda-backed insurgency.

Aviation officials lost contact with Flight AH5017 en route from Burkina Faso to Algeria early on Thursday after a request by the pilot to change course due to bad weather.

Burkina Faso authorities said the passenger list included 51 French, 27 Burkinabe, eight Lebanese, six Algerians, five Canadians, four Germans, two from Luxembourg, one Cameroonian, one Belgian, one Egyptian, one Ukranian, one Swiss, one Nigerian and one Malian. Crash site investigators saw no survivors.

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Missing Air Algerie plane crashed: official

ALGIERS - An Air Algerie flight crashed on Thursday en route from Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso to Algiers with 110 passengers on board, an Algerian aviation official said.

There were few clear indications of what might have happened to the aircraft, or whether there were casualties, but Burkino Faso Transport Minister Jean Bertin Ouedrago said it asked to change route at 0138 GMT because of a storm in the area.

"I can confirm that it has crashed," the Algerian official told Reuters, declining to be identified or give any details about what had happened to the aircraft on its way north.

Almost half of the passengers were French citizens, an airline official said.

Two French fighter jets based in the region have been dispatched to try to locate the airliner along its probable route, a French army spokesman said. Niger security sources said planes were flying over the border region with Mali to search for the flight.

Algeria's state news agency APS said authorities lost contact with flight AH 5017 an hour after it took off from Burkina Faso, but other officials gave differing accounts of the times of contact, adding to confusion about the plane's fate.

Swiftair, the private Spanish company that owns the plane, confirmed it had lost contact with the MD-83 operated by Air Algerie, which it said was carrying 110 passengers and six crew.

A diplomat in the Malian capital Bamako said that the north of the country - which lies on the plane's likely flight path - was struck by a powerful sandstorm overnight.

Whatever the cause, another plane crash is likely to add to nerves in the industry after a Malaysia Airlines plane was downed over Ukraine last week, a TransAsia Airways crashed off Taiwan during a thunderstorm on Wednesday and airlines cancelled flights into Tel Aviv due to the conflict in Gaza.

An Air Algerie representative in Burkina Faso, Kara Terki, told a news conference that all the passengers on the plane were in transit, either for Europe, the Middle East or Canada.

He said the passenger list included 50 French, 24 Burkinabe, eight Lebanese, four Algerians, two from Luxembourg, one Belgian, one Swiss, one Nigerian, one Cameroonian, one Ukrainian and one Romanian. Lebanese officials said there were at least 10 Lebanese citizens on the flight.

A spokeswoman for SEPLA, Spain's pilots union, said the six crew were from Spain. She could not give any further details.

REGIONAL SEARCH

Swiftair said on its website the aircraft took off from Burkina Faso at 0117 GMT and was supposed to land in Algiers at 0510 GMT but never reached its destination.

An Algerian aviation official said the last contact Algerian authorities had with the missing Air Algerie aircraft was at 0155 GMT when it was flying over Gao, Mali.

Aviation authorities in Burkina say they handed the flight to the control tower in Niamey, Niger, at 1:38 a.m. (0138 GMT). They said the last contact with the flight was just after 4:30 a.m. (0330 GMT).

Burkina Faso minister Ouedrago said the flight asked the control tower in Niamey to change route at 0138 GMT because of a storm in the Sahara.

However, a source in the control tower in Niamey, who declined to be identified, said it had not been contacted by the plane, which in theory should have flown over Mali.

Burkinabe authorities have set up a crisis unit in Ouagadougou airport to provide information to families.

Issa Saly Maiga, head of Mali's National Civil Aviation Agency, said that a search was under way for the missing flight.

"We do not know if the plane is Malian territory," he told Reuters. "Aviation authorities are mobilised in all the countries concerned - Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, Algeria and even Spain."

Aviation websites said the missing aircraft, one of four MD-83s owned by Swiftair, was 18-years-old. The aircraft's two engines are made by Pratt & Whitney, a unit of United Technologies.

U.S. planemaker McDonnell Douglas, now part of Boeing , stopped producing the MD-80 airliner family in 1999 but it remains in widespread use. According to British consultancy Flightglobal Ascend, there are 482 MD-80 aircraft in operation, many of them in the United States.

"Boeing is aware of the report (on the missing aircraft). We are awaiting additional information," a spokesman for the planemaker said.

Swiftair has a relatively clean safety record, with five accidents since 1977, two of which caused a total of eight deaths, according to the Washington-based Flight Safety Foundation.

Air Algerie's last major accident was in 2003 when one of its planes crashed shortly after take-off from the southern city of Tamanrasset, killing 102 people. In February this year, 77 people died when an Algerian military transport plane crashed into a mountain in eastern Algeria.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Inside Malaysia Airlines, tears and shock as tragedy strikes again

KUALA LUMPUR - It started with another late-night phone call, another rush to the airport, where familiar faces in a familiar setting tried to make sense of nearly 300 more lives lost in the second disaster to strike Malaysia Airlines in the space of just a few months.

For a company and a nation still struggling to come to terms with the unsolved disappearance of Flight MH370 on March 8, Thursday's apparent shooting down of another Boeing 777 over eastern Ukraine was a devastating blow.

"For something like this to happen, just four months after MH370, just when we were beginning to get on with life, it is just very difficult to take," one airline executive told Reuters at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport, sobbing as he spoke.

"You can't imagine how draining it is, how emotional it is. Everyone can't believe this is happening again, we are going through all of the emotions once again."

After the earlier tragedy, politicians and airline officials were slow to acknowledge the plane had gone missing en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing and then gave confusing, sometimes contradictory statements.

On Thursday, the news began to filter in just after 11 p.m. local time that something had gone wrong with Flight MH17 scheduled from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. Soon after, Malaysian Airline System Bhd executives were awakened and dispatched to the airport to help set up emergency operations, according to interviews with company officials.

"When we entered the room, we looked around and saw the same colleagues, the same familiar faces, that we saw during MH370," said one government official. "And almost everyone was sighing. Gosh, we could not believe that something like this was happening once again."

By 11:30 p.m., Malaysia Airlines (MAS) officials knew from television footage and then confirmation from Ukraine authorities that the plane had gone down. The airline announced on its official Twitter feed that it had lost contact with the aircraft - a change from the March disaster when it was roundly criticised for waiting six hours before acknowledging MH370 was missing.

Before midnight, the officials realized that the 298 passengers and crew were most likely dead.

"People knew the drill this time around - everyone was focused on what they had to do," the government official said. "MAS, the government, the different agencies, the politicians. Everyone had a role and they knew what it was."

PRE-DAWN CALL

This time, the decision was made early that there would be only one spokesperson - Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai, who was had only been appointed late last month.

Before dawn, Prime Minister Najib Razak spoke with U.S. President Barack Obama and issued a detailed statement spelling out what had happened and vowing swift justice for the perpetrators.

"We were better prepared for this, we got the statements out fast and verified everything quickly," a second government official said.

Oliver McGee, a former senior U.S. Transportation Department official, said it was unprecedented for a commercial airline to suffer two tragedies in such rapid succession with more than 530 people dead.

"Malaysia Airlines is now in the fog of the greatest crisis in international aviation safety and security history," McGee said. "I don't see how Malaysia is going to recover from this as a firm."

Defense Minister and former Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein, the public face of the government during the MH370 crisis, tweeted early Friday morning that he was asking the military to confirm reports that the aircraft had been shot down.

"MH17: If indeed our plane was brought down, those responsible WILL be brought to justice!" he wrote.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

MH370 conspiracy theories re-emerge as search sputters

KUALA LUMPUR - The fruitless MH370 search has breathed new life into conspiracy theories on the plane's fate, with a book, two films and even a former prime minister pushing ideas ranging from diversion by the CIA to an accidental shoot-down.

A host of wild theories including a Taliban hijack or meteor strike had emerged to fill the information vacuum in the days following the plane's disappearance on March 8 with 239 aboard as authorities across Asia scrambled to figure out what happened.

The speculation abated after Malaysia said in late March the plane was believed to have gone down in the Indian Ocean for unknown reasons, but has revived due to the failure of an international search effort to find any trace of the plane.

In a blog posting Sunday, former Malaysian premier Mahathir Mohamad put his weight behind online rumours that the Boeing 777 had a feature allowing the plane's controls to be taken over remotely.

The still-influential Mahathir, 88, said the US Central Intelligence Agency might have taken control of the American-made plane after it was commandeered by terrorists, adding it was possible "the plane is somewhere, maybe without MAS (Malaysia Airlines) markings".

"Can it not be that the pilot of MH370 lost control of their aircraft after someone directly or remotely activated the equipment for seizure of control of the aircraft?" Mahathir wrote.

- 'Someone is hiding something' -

"Someone is hiding something. It is not fair that MAS and Malaysia should take the blame. For some reason the media will not print anything that involves Boeing or the CIA," wrote Mahathir, who is known for his anti-western rhetoric.

Similar allegations were floated previously by a newspaper controlled by Malaysia's ruling party -- which was under fire over a perceived bumbling and secretive handling of the crisis.

The suggestion of American involvement was dismissed at the time by the US embassy in Malaysia.

Two films about MH370 were touted Sunday to potential distributors at the Cannes Film Festival in France, with a trailer for one of them -- "The Vanishing Act" -- showing terrified passengers and a gun being brandished.

The film was pitched as "the untold story of the missing Malaysian plane".

One of the first books about MH370 went on sale Monday, suggesting it could have been shot down during a military drill in the South China Sea and the incident covered-up.

London-based author Nigel Cawthorne said there had been a joint Thai-US military exercise at the time and which was to include live-fire exercises.

"Say a participant accidentally shot down Flight MH370. Such things do happen. The cruiser USS Vincennes shot down Iran Air Flight 655 over the Persian Gulf in 1988," he wrote.

"No one wants another Lockerbie, so those involved would have every reason to keep quiet about it," he added, referring to the blowing up of Pan Am flight 103 in 1988 over Lockerbie, Scotland. A Libyan intelligence officer was convicted of that bombing.

Singapore-based aviation analyst Terence Fan said without evidence of the wreckage, "you can't rule anything out but this is very unlikely".

- Reassessing the search -

Malaysia's government has said satellite data indicates the plane probably diverted to the Indian Ocean and crashed after running out of fuel.

But nothing has been found despite weeks of extensive searches at the surface and on the seabed. Malaysia has said it would review the satellite data and reassess the search, possibly deploy more undersea search assets.

Malaysia has announced no findings from various investigations into what caused MH370's disappearance.

Surveys have suggested most Malaysians suspect the corruption-prone government is hiding something, while one in 10 Americans believe "space aliens, time travellers or beings from another dimension" were involved, according to an earlier CNN poll.

Leading theories being probed by investigators include a possible hijacking, rogue pilot action or mechanical failure.

Pilot Zaharie Ahmad Shah, 53, came under scrutiny amid unsubstantiated reports that he was upset over a jail sentence handed to Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim hours before the plane took off or was suicidal due to personal problems.

But his brother-in-law Asuad Khan, in an interview Monday with Australian Broadcasting Corporation, denied Zaharie suffered any emotional problems and suggested he was being used as a scapegoat.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com