2 SA deaths in DRC plane crash
Thu, 07 Sep 2006
Three foreigners and a Congolese pilot died on Wednesday when the private plane they were travelling in crashed in the Democratic Republic of Congo, airport officials said.
One official said the passengers were two South Africans and an American.
"According to our information, there were four people on board, three of them foreigners. There were no survivors," another official, Gustave Ngeleka, told AFP.
The plane, which belonged to the DRC airline ITAB, appeared to have hit an overhead power cable shortly after taking off from Fungurume, a mining area 200 kilometres (125 miles) northwest of Lubumbashi, said Ngeleka.
The plane had taken off at 5pm (3pm GMT) in the direction of Lubumbashi, capital of the mineral-rich Katanga province in southeastern DRC.
ITAB, which is based in Lubumbashi and is often used by mining companies, was not immediately available for comment.
It is one of 50 other DRC airlines on a European Union blacklist of around 100 air companies banned from flying in EU airspace.
Plane crashes are frequent in the DRC, whose fleet is essentially composed of Soviet-made aircraft which are not adequately maintained and sometimes operate without valid licences.
Around 30 people have been killed since the start of 2006 in three air accidents involving private DRC airlines.
In 2005 the DRC authorities reported the deaths of 65 people in around 20 plane crashes.
AFP
,
all seems one's time is numbered up there.