An Ethiopian Airlines passenger aircraft, a Boeing 737 Max, en route from Addis Ababa to Nairobi, Kenya with 157 persons including eight crew on board, has crashed this morning. A spokesperson of the airline confirmed.
Kenyan transportation Minister reportedly claimed passengers from more that 35 countries were on board the crashed plane
The plane was said to have taken off at 8:38am (0638 GMT) (7:38am Nigerian time), from Bole International Airport and “lost contact” six minutes later near Bishoftu, a town some 37 miles southeast of Addis Ababa.
The airline said, “search and rescue operations are in progress and we have no confirmed information about survivors or any possible casualties.”
It said its staff were being sent to the scene of the crash to “do everything possible to assist the emergency services.” It also plans to set up a passenger information centre and a dedicated telephone number for family and friends of people who may have been on board the flight.
Ethiopian Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed in a tweete said: “deepest condolences to the families of those that have lost their loved ones”.
In a statement, the airline said: “We hereby confirm that our scheduled flight ET 302 from Addis Ababa to Nairobi was involved in an accident today. It is believed that there were 149 passengers and eight crew on board the flight but we are currently confirming the details of the passenger manifest for the flight.”
The state-owned Ethiopian Airlines regarded as Africa’s largest carrier which has ambitions of becoming the gateway to the continent has made impactful inroad into Nigerian airspace operating to about three of the nation’s gateway airports.
The crash is coming at a time as the country’s Prime Minister vowed to open up the airline and other sectors of the Ethiopian economy to foreign investment.
The last major accident involving an Ethiopian Airlines passenger plane was a Boeing 737-800 that exploded after taking off from Lebanon in 2010, killing 83 passengers and seven crew.
