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50 FRENCH NATIONALS ONBOARD

Air Algerie flight carrying 116 people missing

, July 24, 2014

Authorities have lost contact with an Air Algerie flight with 110 passengers and six crew on board, Algeria's APS state news agency and a Spanish airline company said.
 
APS said authorities lost contact with flight AH 5017 an hour after it took off from Burkina Faso, although other officials gave other timings, adding to confusion about the fate of the flight and where it might be.
 
Spanish private airline company Swiftair confirmed it had no contact with its MD-83 aircraft operated by Air Algerie.
 
The passenger list of the missing Air Algerie flight included 50 French citizens, the airline's representative in Burkina Faso told a news conference in Ouagadougou.
 
Burkina Faso Transport Minister Jean Bertin Ouedrago said the Air Algerie flight that was en route from Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso to Algiers had asked to change route at 0138 GMT because of a storm in the area.
 
The company said in a notice posted on its website that the aircraft took off from Burkina Faso at 0117 GMT and was supposed to land in Algiers at 0510 GMT but never reached its destination.
 
An Algerian aviation official said the last contact Algerian authorities had with a missing Air Algerie aircraft was at 0155 GMT when it was flying over Gao, Mali.
 
Aviation authorities in Burkina say they handed the flight to the control tower in Niamey, Niger, at 1:38 am (0138 GMT). They said last contact with the flight was just after 4:30 am. (0330 GMT).
 
Burkinabe authorities have set up a crisis unit in Ouagadougou airport to provide information to families of people on the flight.
 
A diplomat in the Malian capital Bamako said that the north of the country - which lies on the plane's likely flight path - was struck by a powerful sandstorm overnight.
 
Issa Saly Maiga, head of Mali's National Civil Aviation Agency, said that a search was under way for the missing flight.
 
"We do not know if the plane is Malian territory," he told Reuters. 
 
"Aviation authorities are mobilised in all the countries concerned - Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, Algeria and even Spain."
 
Whatever is the fate of the flight, the loss of contact is likely to add the to jitters in the airline industry after a Malaysia Airlines plane was downed over Ukraine last week, a TransAsia Airways crashed off Taiwan during a thunderstorm on Wednesday and airlines cancelled flights into Tel Aviv due to the conflict in Gaza.
 
The flight, bound for Algiers, has crashed into the Niger River, according to an unconfirmed source. - Reuters



Tags: missing | Air | algerie |

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