Greece crash: Black boxes found
2005-08-14 17:14
Athens - The flight and cockpit voice recorders of a Cypriot passenger plane which crashed near Athens on Sunday, have been found, a Greek defence ministry official told AFP on condition of anonymity.
The official would not give details.
Questioned by public Net television at the crash site earlier, the head of the civil aviation authority's investigating panel, Akrivos Tsolakis, said investigators were hoping that the black boxes had not been damaged in the crash.
The crash of the Helios Airways Boeing 737 with 121 people on board was Greece's worst air disaster, he said.
Most of the people on board the plane were of Cypriot nationality, a representative of Helios Airways, said.
The representative, George Dimitriou, said the aircraft had been overhauled "last week", denying that it was plagued by problems in the past as reported by Greek media.
"Most people were Cypriots", including a group "of 48 youths on their way to Prague", he said at the airport.
"There were also a certain number of Greeks and only a few foreigners," he said, adding that one of the pilots was German.