Airbus A320 airliner belonging to the German airlines company, Germanwings, subsidiary of Lufthansa, crashed on Tuesday, March 24, 2015 in the French Alps between Barcelonnette and Digne, BBC reported citing French aviation officials and police. The French Transport Ministry, RFI said, disclosed that 150 people were on board the plane that was reportedly en route from Barcelona to Dusseldorf and was carrying 144 passengers and six others were crew members. Reports say 67 of the passengers were Germans and the Spanish deputy Prime Minster said 45 of them had Spanish names.
"The conditions of the accident, which have not yet been clarified, lead us to think there are no survivors,” French President Françoise Hollande said, the BBC quoted. Transport Minister, Alain Vidalies, later on reportedly confirmed the information. President Hollande was cited as further saying that the crash was a tragedy and called for solidarity with the victims, adding that the area of the crash was very difficult to access.
The Prime Minister of France, Manuel Valls reportedly sent the Minister of Interior Bernard Cazeneuve accompanied by the Minister of Ecology, Ségolène Royal and the Secretary of State for Transport, Alain Vidalies to the scene of the crash, RFI reported. Speaking later on, he said, "A helicopter managed to land (by the crash site) and has confirmed that unfortunately there were no survivors,” Reuters quoted.
"The aircraft's contact with French radar, French air traffic controllers ended at 10.53 am at an altitude of about 6,000 feet. The plane then crashed," Germanwings' Managing Director Thomas Winkelmann told a news conference,, Reuters reported. RFI cited the Spokesperson of the French Interior Ministry, Henry Brandet as saying that over 400 rescue personnel were mobilized for the incident. However, the rescue mission could not be easy owing to the difficult access to the area.
Reacting to the plane crash, the Chief Executive Officer of Lufthansa, Carsten Spohr reportedly said they did not yet know what happened. He however, expressed sympathies to the families of the passengers and crew members, praying that survivors should be found.
