No Reports On Survivors, Casualties

ANN REALTIME UPDATE 05.06.07 16.54 EDT:  Kenya Airways confirmed the wreckage of flight KQ 507 has been located in swampland in southwest Cameroon.

The plane, with 114 people aboard, sent out a distress signal shortly after taking off from Douala in a storm after midnight Friday (local time), headed for Nairobi.

The wreckage was seen from the air shortly before nightfall Sunday, 15 miles southeast of Douala, the Cameroon city where the Boeing 737-800 had taken off shortly after midnight on Saturday, according to Celestine Ngoue, the General Inspector of Cameroon's Civil Aviation Authority, reported CNN.

He said rescue teams were trying to reach the site, but may not be able to do so until first light Monday, as the wreckage was in an inaccessible area of swamps and forest.

Ngoue said some 200 rescue workers were on standby in Douala. The NTSB is sending a team to assist Cameroon in its investigation of the crash.

Ngoue had no information on whether the wreckage was spread over a wide area but said authorities were certain it was the Kenyan plane.

Relatives waiting at Nairobi's airport were distraught as news reports about the missing plane came in. Dozens of family members collapsed and cried in the airport terminal.

The company's chief executive Titus Naikuni spoke at a news conference in Nairobi.

"Kenya Airways regrets to confirm that its flight KQ 507 has been located on a mangrove swamp around 20 kilometers (12 miles) south of Douala on the planned flight path."

"At this time search and rescue operations are in progress and we have no confirmed information about survivors or any possible casualties," he said.

"The reason, apparently, that it was not sighted much earlier was that the aircraft was covered by trees."

A search and rescue team, including Kenya Airways staff, was still at the accident scene, he said, adding that local fishermen had helped them locate the wreckage.

The Cameroonian Government says there has been no immediate word on any survivors.

"For now we cannot say whether there were any survivors or not. Access to the area is very difficult," Minister of State for Territorial Administration Hamidou Yaya Marafa said.

"We are beginning a new painful phase. Our task will be more difficult now, the task of recovering the corpses," he said.

Another Cameroonian official has ruled out the possibility of any survivors.

"A team of specialists should arrive at the scene tomorrow (Monday), notably experts to identify bodies through DNA," said the official, who declined to be named.

"Signs" Found of Jet Downed in Africa

ANN REALTIME UPDATE 05.06.07 0856 EDT: The chief of meteorology for Doula airport, from where Kenya Flight KQ 507 took off called the state radio report that the crash site had been located "premature," refusing further further comment and noting that the search for the plane's wreckage was continuing, reported The Associated Press and The Washington Post.

However, "signs" of the Kenya-bound flight have been found, an aviation official said Sunday. Chief of Meteorology Thomas Sobakam declined to describe the signs, but said they were not pieces of wreckage.

A spokesman for Keya Airways said Kenyan officials had also received reports that the plane had been found, but could not confirm them.

"We have the same information, that the crash site has been located 180 kilometers (about 100 miles) from Douala," he said. "We have people on the ground and there appears to be conflicting information."

A Kenya Airways official added at Saturday's Nairobi news conference that the plane stopped emitting emergency signals after an initial distress call, though an automatic device should have kept up emissions for another two days.

"Why the signal is not being heard right now, we're not quite sure," said Kenya Airways CEO Titus Naikuni.

An international search includes Kenyan officials and French helicopters, while the US and Boeing have sent experts.

Sobakam said at least 20 search-and-rescue vehicles left Saturday, spent the night in the bush,  and are now positioned at strategic points inside the vast forest and searching methodically. The effort includes a team of Cameroonian firefighters, as well as several teams led by MTN, a South African cell phone company that had several employees on board the crashed jet.

Helicopters have resumed combing the tree canopy for signs of the wreckage.

The jet bound for the Kenyan capital went down early Saturday near Lolodorf, about 90 miles southeast of the coastal city of Douala, where it had taken off after midnight Friday, said Alex Bayeck, a regional communications officer. There was no word on survivors.

Infrastructure is poor in Cameroon's interior; much of the search area is only accessible by dirt tracks that turn to impassable mud in the rainy season. The country of 17 million on Africa's western coast has oil reserves and lush farmland but many of its citizens remain poor subsistence farmers.

Boeing spokesman Jim Proulx said the plane was equipped with an emergency transmitter that sends out an automatic locator signal "in the event of a rapid change in velocity."

Proulx told The Associated Press that the transmitter would have been activated upon impact and can also be turned on by the plane's flight crew.

Kenya Airlines CEO Titus Naikuni had said the plane was almost new. Sunday, he said Kenya Airways had no plans to ground the other two Boeing 737-800s in its fleet.

"We have checked the history of the aircraft with the manufacturer ... We don't believe at this particular moment that there is anything that would force us to stop operating the other two," Naikuni said.

Naikuni had said the plane took off an hour late because of rain. Douala airport officials confirmed thunderstorms at the time, but said that was unlikely to have been the sole cause of the accident.

"There was a thunderstorm, but there were other planes that left after (the Kenya Airways flight to Nairobi) that had no problems," said Sobatam, the Douala meteorology chief.

Kenya Airlines Plane Found

ANN REALTIME UPDATE 05.06.07 0750 EDT: The Kenya Airways plane with 114 aboard reported missing on Saturday in southern Cameroon had been found, Reuters reported.

The central African country’s state radio interrupted its programming Sunday morning to report the find; no mention was made of casualties or the state of the aircraft.

The plane was found near the village of Awanda, near the town of Mvengue, southwest of the capital Yaounde, the radio said.

Kenya Airways Flight KQ 507, a Boeing 737-800, was bound for Nairobi and went missing early on Saturday shortly after takeoff from Douala in Cameroon.

Local officials could not be reached for immediate comment, reported Reuters.

ANN REALTIME UPDATE 05.05.07 1620 EDT: Kenya Airlines revised downwards the number of passengers on board, from 106 according to previous statements, to 105, for a total of 114 aboard when contact with the 737-800 was lost shortly after takeoff, reported CNN.

Heavy rain and the thick forest have been hampering efforts of officials to locate the plane. Military and civil aviation helicopters have been scouring a wide zone in the central African country.

"We've even sent boys out on motorcycles along main routes in the region to see whether they can see any trace of the plane crash," Jean-Francois Nzenang, senior administrative officer for the region around Kribi. "It's raining, which is impeding the search, but for now it is still going on... Some of the area is inaccessible by road and there are no telecommunications signals. The plane was carrying passengers from more than 20 countries."

Although state radio earlier reported the plane had crashed near Nieté, north of the border with Equatorial Guinea, after wreckage had not been found in the area, the search involving radar-equipped helicopters moved to an area southwest of the capital -- between the towns of Lolodorf and Ebolowa.

Residents in the area, which has few roads and is dotted by small villages, reported hearing a "large boom" during the night, and some said they saw a flash of fire that looked markedly different from lightning.

Kenya Airways CEO Titus Naikuni has held back on confirming the crash "until we see the plane -- until then, it's missing," he said.

The Associated Press said Anthony Mitchell, a Nairobi-based AP correspondent, was believed to be on the flight. Three Cameroon referees were also aboard the Kenya Airways plane, a Confederation of African Football official said Saturday. The officials were on their way to Kinshasa via Nairobi to officiate at an African Confederation Cup match on Sunday.

Government spokesman Dr. Alfred Mutua said the first team of specialists will be leaving the country for Cameroon Sunday morning.

President Mwai Kibaki has assured the families and friends of those onboard the flight that his Government is in close touch with the Government authorities in Cameroon to try and ascertain the fate of the missing Kenya Airways plane.

Original Story

1030 EDT: Kenya Airways Flight KQ 507, flying from Abdijan in Ivory Coast to Nairobi via Douala, in Cameroon, crashed in southern Cameroon, state radio reported Saturday.

The Boeing 737-800 was carrying 106 passengers, eight crew members and a flight engineer. According to the airline, the flight was carrying 79 Africans, 21 Asians, seven Europeans, one US citizen, and six others. Most of the passengers were connecting through Nairobi to other destinations outside Kenya, reported Bloomberg.

The flight departed Douala, Cameroon at 12:05 am and was to arrive in Nairobi, the Kenyan capital, at 6:15 am. The flight originated in Ivory Coast but stopped in Cameroon, the airline said, to pick up more passengers.

"The last message from the aircraft was received at the control tower (in Doula) immediately after takeoff," said Kenya Airways CEO Titus Naikuni. "After, the tower lost contact with the aircraft. So far, no one has been able to establish contact,."

CNN reports a Cameroon radio station stated the plane crashed near the town of Niete, in the south of the country, while a top Cameroon government official reported, "We have located the plane ... and we cannot talk about it."

However, Naikuni wouldn't confirm an Agence France-Presse report the plane had crashed and been located. Only national civil aviation authorities can release such information, he said.

The aircraft is six months old, Naikuni said. He did not release the credentials of the pilot.

The airline opened a crisis management center near the Nairobi airport.

Ten to 15 people were waiting at Nairobi airport arrivals early Saturday, guarded by several police officers.

"We have been told to sit and wait," said one relative of a passenger on the plane. "A lot of people are crying, people are asking what is happening."

Kenyan government spokesman Alfred Mutua said the government was on alert.

"We are working on modalities to assist in any rescue operation," he told Agence France-Presse.

In January 2000 a Kenya Airways Airbus A310 crashed into the sea after taking off from Abidjan airport in Ivory Coast, killing 169 passengers and crew.

Air France-KLM owns a 26 percent stake in Kenya Airways, Africa's second largest carrier.

FMI: www.kcaa.or.ke, www.kenya-airways.com