The 157 victims of an Ethiopian Airlines plane crash on Sunday morning, shortly after the aircraft took off, according to the CEO of Ethiopian Airlines and the Kenyan Minister of Transport.
According to the airline's statement, 149 passengers and eight crew members were aboard the plane when it crashed, six minutes after leaving Addis Ababa for the Kenyan capital. The accident occurred at 8:44 am (Addis Ababa time) around Bishoftu, or Debre Zeit, some 50 kilometers south of Addis Ababa.
Many Canadian politicians have offered condolences to families.
"Terrible news from Ethiopia this morning. Our thoughts are with the ET302 victims, including the Canadians on board and those who lost loved ones. Canadians who need help can write to sos@international.gc.ca or call 613-996-8885, "Prime Minister Justin Trudeau wrote on his Twitter account.
Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland also offered her condolences. She also indicated that "the Canadian government is in close contact with the Ethiopian authorities to collect additional information as soon as possible".
Conservative Party leader Andrew Scheer said he was "sorry to hear about the Ethiopian Airlines plane crash" and offered his condolences to relatives of the missing, especially the families of the Canadians killed.
He also recommended that Canadians who are healthy in Ethiopia or Kenya tell their loved ones that they are safe.
"Unknown causes"
The authorities do not know the cause of the disaster.
The Boeing 737-8 MAX was new and had been delivered to the airline last November.
Ethiopian Airlines, a public company that is often considered the best managed airline in Africa, prides itself on being the largest carrier on the African continent.
The Ethiopian public channel EBC announced that the 157 people aboard were dead, the victims are nationals of 33 countries.
Relatives of the victims gathered at Bole airport.
In a statement, the Ethiopian prime minister's office presented his "deepest condolences" to the families.
"My prayers go to all the families and loved ones of those on board," Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta said, as many Kenyans prepared for the worst.
Kenya's Transport Minister James Macharia said an emergency operation was set up for the family and friends of the victims.
In a statement, Boeing said he was "deeply saddened" by the crash and that a technical team was ready to provide assistance at the request of the US National Transportation Safety Board.
Reports indicate that the plane was new. The Planespotters civil aviation database indicates that the Boeing 737-8 MAX was delivered to Ethiopian Airlines in mid-November.
The commercial flight information site, Flightradar 24, reported that the aircraft had "unstable vertical speed" after take-off while the visibility appeared to be clear.
In an interview with Canadian Press, Mehran Ebrahimi, a professor in the Department of Management and Technology at the School of Management Sciences at UQAM, said that pilots have already reported some stabilization problems with the Boeing 737 -8 MAX, a new device. "For some time, pilots have been talking to us about the Boeing 737 Max problems, that does not mean that the plane necessarily has a problem, but the pilots tell us that the plane has some stabilization problems in certain situations."
In October, another Boeing 737-8 MAX plunged into the Java Sea just minutes after taking off from Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia, killing the 189 people on board. The cockpit data logger showed that the aircraft's speedometer had malfunctioned in its last four flights, although Lion Air had initially claimed that the problems with the aircraft had been resolved.
The last fatal accident of an Ethiopian Airlines passenger plane was in 2010, a few minutes after the Beirut aircraft took off, the 90 people on board had been killed.
According to Mehran Ebrahimi, Ethiopian Airlines is a carrier with an excellent reputation. "It's an excellent company. AT
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