Ethiopian Airlines: victims’ families to visit crash site

Family members of the victims of the Ethiopian Airlines crash that killed 157 people were to visit the site of the accident on Wednesday, an official said.

Asrat Begashaw, Head of Public Relations at Ethiopian Airlines, said embassy officials from various nations would
accompany the families on the grim trip to the scene where human remains are still being gathered.

“What we have collected so far is stored in freezers but there are plans to move them to hospitals. DNA work has not started yet,” Begashaw said.

Meanwhile, officials have yet to decide where to send the retrieved black box for investigation into why the Boeing 737 MAX 8 went down on Sunday shortly after take-off for Nairobi.

“There is no decision made yet on where to send it. What we can say is we don’t have the capability to probe it here in Ethiopia,’’ Begashaw said.

The crash, which was the second deadly accident involving that model of Boeing in several months, hit the U.S.
manufacturer hard – with its share price dropping and much of the world grounding those aircraft or banning it from their skies.

Boeing has said it is still safe to fly, and the U.S. remains one of few countries that has not temporarily banned the model from its airspace.

U.S. officials arrived in Ethiopia on Tuesday to help with investigations into the crash, which killed 157 on board.