Aviation accidents and incidents

Air India flight diverted as cockpit door jams

Agence France-PresseMay 15, 2013 01:01

An Air India flight to Bangalore was diverted to another city after the pilot returned from a toilet break and found the door to the cockpit jammed shut, the state-run carrier said Tuesday. The flight left Delhi for Bangalore on Monday but the plane had to be diverted to Bhopal in central India when the pilot realised he could not get back to the controls. "The commander of the flight had left the cockpit for a short while to visit the toilet and on returning to the cockpit found the door locked," Air India said in a news release.

Death toll in Bangladesh factory collapse soars past 1,100 as recovery operation continues

The Canadian PressMay 11, 2013 09:00

SAVAR, Bangladesh - Police say the death toll from the collapse of a garment factory building in Bangladesh has soared past 1,100 as recovery operations continue. Doctors say a seamstress who was rescued 17 days after the eight-story building collapsed is recovering in a hospital, but is exhausted, panicked and dehydrated. Her discovery in the rubble Friday brought a boost to the rescue workers. By Saturday, they had resumed their grim task and the death toll reached 1,115 in the world's worst garment industry disaster.

Russia seeks to solve 'ghost plane' mystery that killed 13

Agence France-PresseMay 6, 2013 03:46

Russian investigators were Monday seeking to determine the cause of a plane crash last June that killed all 13 on board, after the victims' remains were finally discovered following almost a year of fruitless searching. Two hunters at the weekend stumbled upon the the An-2 plane in a marsh eight kilometres (five miles) outside the town of Serov in the Sverdlovsk region in the Ural Mountains in central Russia.

US military plane crashes in Kyrgyzstan: ministry

Agence France-PresseMay 3, 2013 21:45

A military plane crashed shortly after taking off from a United States airbase in Kyrgyzstan on Friday, officials said, though there were no immediate reports of any injuries. "According to my information, the plane broke up into three pieces. Information on the dead or wounded is being clarified. All the rescue services have gone to the scene," the emergency situations ministry's press secretary Abdisharip Bekilov said.

Bosses arrested over Bangladesh building disaster

Agence France-PresseApril 27, 2013 08:16

Bangladesh Saturday made a series of arrests over the collapse of a factory complex which killed at least 341 as rescuers braved the stench of rotting corpses to detect further signs of life. Twenty-three people were pulled alive Saturday morning from the ruins of the eight-storey Rana Plaza compound which caved in at around 9:00am on Wednesday while thousands of garment workers were stitching clothes for Western brands. But emergency workers warned their task was getting steadily harder as survivors were losing their strength to call for help.

Bosses arrested over Bangladesh building disaster

Agence France-PresseApril 27, 2013 05:00

Police made a series of arrests Saturday over Bangladesh's factory collapse disaster as the death toll rose to 337 and distraught relatives lashed out at rescuers struggling to detect signs of life. Around 40 people were pulled alive overnight from the ruins of the eight-storey Rana Plaza compound which caved in on Wednesday morning while thousands of garment workers were stitching clothes for Western brands. But emergency workers warned their task was getting harder as any survivors still trapped in the rubble were now too weak to call for help.

Part found in New York thought to be from 9/11 plane

Agencia EFEApril 26, 2013 19:01

New York, Apr 26 (EFE).- A piece of landing gear thought to be from one of the two airliners that hijackers crashed into the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, was founded near ground zero, a New York Police Department spokesman confirmed to Efe Friday. The NYPD established a crime scene at the site after receiving a call from the owners of a building at 51 Park Place in Lower Manhattan. The part bears a clearly visible Boeing identification number, police said. Both of the planes used in the attack on the World Trade Center were manufactured by Boeing.

Rescuers find 50 survivors in Bangladesh compound

Agence France-PresseApril 26, 2013 10:16

Rescue teams found around 50 people alive Friday on the third floor of a collapsed garment factory compound on the outskirts of the Bangladeshi capital, a fire brigade official said. "We have found around 50 people still alive at several places on the third floor after digging tunnels. We hope we can rescue them by tomorrow morning," said Sheikh Mizanur Rahman, deputy director of the Bangladeshi fire service. "We've rescued about 80 people alive from the rubble today including at least eight people who have been rescued just a few minutes back," he told AFP.

Bangladesh rescuers find 45 alive, toll at 272

Agence France-PresseApril 25, 2013 23:15

Bangladeshi rescuers have hauled another 45 people alive from the rubble of a collapsed complex housing garment factories, although the death toll has risen to 272, officials said Friday. "We have rescued 45 people today including 41 we found in one place alive," national fire department chief Ahmed Ali told AFP two days after the disaster, adding that the 41 had been on the fourth floor of the eight-storey block. The 41 people were found at 2:30 am (2030 GMT Thursday) and the other four elsewhere in the wreckage at 7:00 am (0100 GMT Friday), he said.

Boeing 787 battery meltdown cause still unclear

Agence France-PresseApril 23, 2013 19:47

US safety officials investigating burned batteries on two Boeing 787s said Tuesday they are not certain what caused the incidents, even as aviation regulators approve Boeing's fix for the problem. Four days after the Federal Aviation Administration cleared the 787 to return to flight, the National Transportation Safety Board opened a two-day public hearing to examine how the pioneering lithium-ion battery system was designed and approved for use. At the end of the first day, Debbie Hersman, chairwoman of the safety board, said they heard new information on the problems.