No survivors in Cambodian plane crash

[PeteC]

KAMPOT, Cambodia (AFP) - A plane crash earlier this week in southern Cambodia killed all 22 people aboard, including South Korean and Czech tourists, officials said Wednesday after rescuers found the wreckage.

"Nobody survived," said Prime Minister Hun Sen, who traveled to this coastal town near the crash site -- located in dense forest on a remote mountain -- to oversee recovery operations.

He blamed bad weather rather than mechanical failure for Monday's accident, which was Cambodia's deadliest air crash in a decade.

"This accident was not caused by a technical problem of the plane," he said, adding though that all planes operating in the country would be inspected.

"If they are too old we will ban them from flying in our country," he said.

The chartered Russian-made AN-24, which disappeared after leaving the Angkor temple town of Siem Reap early Monday en route to the seaside resort of Sihanoukville, appeared to have hit a mountain, officials said.

It was not known if any of the people on board -- 13 South Koreans, three Czechs, a Russian pilot and five local crew -- had survived the initial impact but died in the two days it took rescuers to find the wreckage, officials said.

Only a handful of rescuers had thus far been able to reach the isolated crash site.

"We found the crashed plane ... on top of Bokor Mountain, but we cannot get there now," said Khov Khun Huor, deputy governor of Kampot province, adding the aircraft was lying "in pieces."

Heavy fog since Monday made air searches nearly impossible while rains turned jungle trails into muddy rivulets, hampering the more than 1,000 police, soldiers and conservation workers who scoured the remote area for the plane.

But after a break in the weather Wednesday, the wreckage was sighted by a helicopter about 50 kilometres (30 miles) from its destination.

The discovery came as dozens of South Koreans arrived in Cambodia to mourn relatives on the doomed flight, while a South Korean team was preparing to recover the bodies, Kampot's deputy police chief Nuon Sary told AFP.

Khov Khun Huor said earlier that the plane had crashed in dense forest, and that rescuers would have a difficult time getting salvage equipment to the site.

"We need to cut the trees before we can go in there to see," he said.

Hun Sen said seven corpses so far had been pulled from the wreckage, and that he hoped to have all of the bodies recovered by the end of the day, explaining that the aircraft was crushed and had to be cut apart.

The bodies would be taken to the capital where forensics experts would help identify them, he said.

South Korean diplomats said Tuesday they had the names of the 13 Korean tourists on board, including two boys aged two and seven years. In 2006, South Koreans made up the largest number of Cambodia's 1.7 million foreign visitors.

Television reports showed groups of stricken Korean relatives leaving the airport in Phnom Penh on buses, surrounded by Korean press. They were expected to make their way to Kampot to await news of their loved ones.

The crash highlighted the country's need to bolster domestic air safety amid an increase in tourist arrivals.

The plane was operated by Progress Multi Transportation (PMT) Air, which runs mainly domestic flights. It has had at least three accidents or in-flight emergencies in the past two years, and was temporarily grounded at one point.

PMT opened a route between Siem Reap and Sihanoukville in January to boost tourism.

South Korea's ministry of construction and transportation has called for PMT's fleet to undergo safety checks.

Cambodia's last significant air accident occurred in 1997, when a Vietnam Airlines flight from Ho Chi Minh City to Phnom Penh crashed in heavy monsoon rain as it attempted to land at the capital's international airport.

Sixty-four people were killed in that crash. Only two infants, a Thai boy and a Vietnamese boy, survived.

[Bamboo Grove]

It´s a scary thought but I was in the air about the same time, having left Phnom Penh on Air Asia flight for Bangkok at 08.40 and a friend of mine on Bangkok Airways flight that left an hour later. Although we had no problems but I felt there was quite a lot turbulence that morning. Must have been the heavy rains a little bit southward.
When we met at Suwannaphoom he said to me: "Before we left I was thinking would one of us be the unlucky one and be in a plane that crashes, now that we are on different flights." At the same time this unlucky plane had crashed not too far away from us.

[PeteC]

I doubt this plane had any kind of collision avoidance warning system. However, the pilot should have been aware of how high the mountain tops are in the country. I doubt we'll ever find out in this case but many of these airlines employ foreign pilots. I'm wondering if this was the case here, someone inexperienced with the Cambodian terrain? Pete

[Bamboo Grove]

I think the co-pilot was Russian.

[Onlyme]

I was on "Bokor Hill" several years ago, I visited it on the way to Kep, there were no roads then and the place seemed a bit "weird."
It has been a place that invaders always wanted to occupy as it was strategically placed high-up on the mountain.
There but for the grace of God, go I.
Onlyme.

[STEVE G]

I doubt this plane had any kind of collision avoidance warning system. However, the pilot should have been aware of how high the mountain tops are in the country. I doubt we'll ever find out in this case but many of these airlines employ foreign pilots. I'm wondering if this was the case here, someone inexperienced with the Cambodian terrain? Pete :(

Pete, all aircraft operated in the west have a terrain avoidance system that uses a GPS position signal and altitude, combined with a database of all the land in the world that gives you warnings to stop you flying into mountains and other obstacles. It is a very reliable system and some aircraft now have virtual terrain displays that allow you to see a 3D picture of how the terrain looks around you.
Needless to say, Cambodian registered AN24’s don’t come with this level of sophistication. This is unfortunate as you can actually buy this sort of system for fit in light aircraft for less than 10,000 dollars, which is peanuts in aviation.

[PeteC]

An excerpt from today's follow up article. Pete
___________________

.........Those killed in Monday's crash were en route to the seaside resort of Sihanoukville from Siem Reap, where they had visited the Angkor temples, Cambodia's most famed tourist draw.

Their Russian-made AN-24, which was also carrying three Czechs, five Cambodian crew and a pilot from Uzbekistan -- not Russia, as Cambodian officials had originally reported -- slammed into the side of a mountain during bad weather, just minutes from its destination.

No one survived the crash, which was Cambodia's deadliest air disaster in a decade and highlights safety concerns for the country's nascent domestic air industry as tourist numbers continue to rise.

The plane was operated by Progress Multi Transportation (PMT) Air, which has had at least three accidents or in-flight emergencies in the past two years, and was temporarily grounded at one point.

United Nations staff have been banned from flying PTM since 2005.

The airline opened a route between Siem Reap and Sihanoukville in January to boost tourism, and South Korea's ministry of construction and transportation has called for PMT's fleet to undergo safety checks.

But Cambodia's government has said it would allow the troubled airline to continue plying its domestic and international routes pending an investigation of the aircraft's flight data recorders, and downplayed safety concerns.

"Even before the accident we were taking measures -- we are always strengthening air safety, both the regulations and technical aspects," Cambodia's civil aviation cabinet chief Him Sarun told AFP.

PMT's Siem Reap to Sihanoukville service has been suspended.