Work to recover tail, landing gear of crashed A320 liner underway

Work to recover tail, landing gear of crashed A320 liner underway

ITAR-TASS News Agency
TASS
May 3, 2006 Wednesday

KRASNODAR, May 3 — On the site of the crash of the A320 passenger
liner of the Armenian airlines Armavia work is underway to recover
the spotted parts of the plane.

A source at the Krasnodar Territory prosecutor’s office has confirmed
reports that so far the bodies of 38 victims have been recovered.

“The bodies are being taken ashore for identification. Another 26
fragments of victims’ bodies have been found,” the source said.

The prosecutor’s office has said it is too early to discuss any causes
of the disaster, because nothing can be ruled out at this point,
including technical problems, the human factor or explosion.

“The crew’s captain first made a decision to make a landing, but poor
visibility and bad weather forced him to change his mind, so he told
the air traffic controller he was returning to Yerevan. However, a
short while later the conditions improved. The range of visibility on
one runway was 100 meters, and on the other, 360 meters. The captain
made a final decision to land at Adler. A short while later the plane
crashed,” the territorial prosecutor’s office said.

A team of investigators from the Russian Prosecutor-General’s office
has left Moscow for Adler to help investigate the incident on site.

The chief of the Prosecutor General’s Office special investigations
department, Vladimir Lyseiko is leading the panel of inquiry.