Benin crash: plane overloaded

2003-12-29 14:53

Cotonou - At least 135 people were killed when a Beirut-bound Boeing 727 crashed on Christmas Day in the west African state of Benin, the Benin government said on Monday in a new official toll.

Of the 151 passengers and 10 crew members listed on the manifest of the plane operated by the Lebanese-owned Union des Transports Africains (UTA), 24 people are confirmed to have survived, among them the plane's co-pilot, a Libyan national.

Benin had put the official death toll at 130, after the plane crashed during takeoff last Thursday, smashing into a building and tumbling nose-first into the Gulf of Guinea. It marked the worst crash in both Benin's and Lebanon's aviation history.

Lebanese Foreign Minister Jean Obeid, who headed an official delegation to Benin following the crash, said on returning to Beirut on Saturday that "preliminary information indicated there was an excess number of passengers and a great excess of luggage - the plane could not take off."

French experts are examining the black box voice and data recorders recovered from the wreckage of the ill-fated flight.

- AFP