Kabul: Weather hampers search
2005-02-06 12:47
Kabul - Local and foreign police and troops struggled on Sunday to reach the spot where a Afghan plane carrying 104 people crashed in rugged snowclad mountains east of Kabul, with officials conceding there is little or no chance of finding any survivors.
Bad weather hampered helicopter flights to the area and ground troops have been told to try to reach the site, officials said.
"The weather on site is not good at this stage," said a spokesman for the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), Lieutenant Colonel Patrick Poulain.
"We hope there will be a possibility again by the end of the morning."
Officials say around 1 000 Afghan police and soldiers are involved in the operation.
"There is about one to two meters of snow and we estimate that another 50cm of snow fell overnight. The landing zone is very difficult due to steepness, snow and the general terrain", Major Karen Tissot van Patot, another spokeswoman, told AFP.
"Ground troops are in the area but not at the exact place yet" she said. "They are trying to get closer by ground."
Asked how long it would take, she said: "It really depends a lot on the day-by-day weather situation."
Some local media reports said there could be a minefield in the area but the spokesperson could not confirm that.
The private Kam Air Boeing 737-200 went missing on Thursday during a domestic flight from the western city of Herat to Kabul.
Its wreckage was spotted 30km east of Kabul at an altitude of 3 000m on Saturday during a joint search by Afghan police and soldiers and ISAF troops.
There were 24 foreigners aboard - six Americans, one Iranian, three Italians, nine Turks, one Canadian and four Russian crew members.
"So far we don't think there are any survivors," interior ministry spokesman Lutfullah Mashal said on Saturday. "The plane is completely destroyed."
But transportation minister Anayatullah Qasimi told a press conference that the search and rescue operation would continue.
"First we will take the passengers who are alive or injured, and then the bodies will also be carried as well," he said.
The authorities had planned to fly troops to the crash site Sunday but no helicopter could take off in the early morning. Afghan soldiers were therefore ordered to try ground operations.
"Due to bad weather, helicopters cannot fly, that is why the ground troops have been told to try to move towards the site and climb there if possible," said defence ministry spokesperson, General Zahir Azimi.
Low cloud and very difficult terrain was complicating the operation and soldiers deployed around the site have said it could take days to get closer.
Kabul is surrounded by mountains. Afghanistan's rugged landscape, 40% of which is 1 800m or more above sea level, presents a challenge to pilots.
Overseas peacekeeping troops and Afghan forces launched the hunt for the aircraft after it disappeared from radar screens on Thursday.
- AFP