Cuban air disaster toll hits 111, Mexico suspends leasing firm
The death toll in one of Cuba’s worst air disasters rose to 111 yesterday, while Mexico suspended the operations of the Mexican company that had leased the 39-year old Boeing 737 to Cuba’s flagship airline.
Grettel Landrove, a 23-year old Cuban student who loved to dance flamenco, died in a Havana hospital from “severe traumatic lesions,” Cuban state-run media reported.
Two Cuban women remained in critical condition due to burns and other trauma, with a high risk of complications, media reports said. Their progress is being closely followed by many Cubans through regular hospital updates.
The airliner crashed shortly after take-off on a domestic flight from Havana to the eastern city of Holguin on Friday.
The accident has killed 100 Cubans, seven Mexicans, two Argentines and two Sahrawis from a disputed area in the Western Sahara known as the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic.
The plane was a Boeing 737 built in 1979 and leased to Cuba’s flagship carrier Cubana by a little-known Mexican company Damojh.
Mexico’s civil aviation authority said on Monday it had temporarily suspended Damojh’s operations while it made sure the firm adhered to regulations and gathered information to help investigators find the cause of the crash.
Damojh, which owned three 737s before the accident, has been suspended twice before during regulatory compliance reviews, the authority said.
Operations were halted for about a month in 2010 after a Damojh plane made an emergency landing in the Mexican beach resort of Puerto Vallarta due to a problem with its landing gear.
The authority investigated again in 2013 after receiving a complaint from Marco Aurelio Hernandez, who was identified on the weekend by Mexican media as a former Damojh pilot.
Hernandez was quoted by Mexican newspaper Milenio as criticizing Damojh for a lack of adequate maintenance on its planes. The 2013 probe led to a two-month suspension.
Most aircraft accidents take months to investigate. Cuban investigators have so far recovered the cockpit voice recorder and are still looking for the flight data recorder.
Cuba will lead the probe, with the aid of Mexican and US investigators.
It will receive technical assistance from Boeing and Pratt & Whitney, part of US-based industrial group United Technologies, which manufactured the engines.
Friday’s crash was the worst in Cuba since a Soviet-built Ilyushin-62M plane came down near Havana in 1989, killing all 126 people on board and 14 on the ground.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
- RSS
- |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证:沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证:31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证:0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证:沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证:沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.