New pain for air-crash families
2004-01-07 19:20
Sharm el-Sheikh - Families of those who died in the crash of an Egyptian plane here will have to cope with the extra burden of knowing they will never find their bodies, said a French psychiatrist on Wednesday.
Ronan Orio, heading a team of psychiatrists and psychologists to help the families deal with their loss when they arrive here on Wednesday for memorial ceremonies, said only body parts had been found until now.
"So, we can assume it will be much harder for them to deal with it psychologically than if they were able to see the dead person, as happens usually," said Orio.
A Boeing 737-300, operated by the Egyptian charter firm Flash Airlines, crashed before dawn on Saturday off the coast of this Red Sea resort, killing all 148 passengers and crew.
Besides 133 French tourists, there were also a Moroccan and a Japanese passenger aboard in addition to the 13 Egyptian crew.
About 109 family members were en route from Paris to attend ceremonies on shore and at sea on Thursday.
"The most important thing is that everything should be as well organised and dignified as possible," said Orio.
He said the trip to Sharm El-Sheikh would allow the families to visualise the setting of the drama and trace back the last days and moments of the victims' lives.
Nosedived into sea
"Instead of having traumatising images in their heads, they perhaps will be able to turn (the deaths) into memories" to which they can adjust and go on with their lives," he said.
"The families will ask themselves what they (the victims) had been doing here, what they were looking for," Orio said.
"They will try to recapture the image they had of their relatives by trying to understand their trip and the reasons why they found death here."
According to Egyptian and French officials, the plane nosedived into the sea at high speed because of a yet unidentified technical failure.
They said about 60 human body parts had been recovered as they floated on the water or close to the surface.
None of the six most-complete human body parts was indentifiable, and France has dispatched a team of forensic experts to conduct DNA tests.
Because of the depth at which the plane lies, the investigation has been unable so far to determine whether the fuselage of the plane totally desintegrated or part of it remained under the water, with corpses trapped inside.
- AFP