Former pop star among victims of plane crash
PAKISTAN: Pakistan is mourning the 47 victims of its deadliest plane crash in four years, among them a famous pop star turned Muslim evangelist, two infants and three foreigners, as officials seek to pinpoint the cause of the disaster.
Engine trouble was initially believed responsible, but many questions remain, raising new worries about the safety record of money-losing state carrier Pakistani International Airlines.
The ATR-42 aircraft involved in the crash had undergone regular maintenance, including an ‘‘A-check’’ certification in October, airline chairman Muhammad Azam Saigol said, ruling out technical or human error.
The aircraft appeared to have suffered a failure in one of its two turboprop engines just before the crash, he said, but this would have to be confirmed by an investigation.
Outpourings of grief erupted online soon after flight PK661 smashed into the side of a mountain near the town of Havelian, in Khyber-pakhtunkhwa province, yesterday, after taking off from the mountain resort of Chitral. It crashed just 50km short of its destination, the international airport in the capital, Islamabad.
Much of the anguish focused on Junaid Jamshed, the vocalist for Vital Signs, one of Pakistan’s first and most successful rock and pop bands of the 1990s, who abandoned his musical career in 2001 to become a travelling evangelist with the conservative Tableeghi Jamaat group.
The foreign victims were two Austrians and a Chinese man, the airline said. A member of Chitral’s traditional royal family, his wife and family were among the dead.
The aircraft, made by French company ATR in 2007, had racked up 18,739 flight hours since joining PIA’S fleet that year. Its captain, Saleh Janjua, had logged more than 12,000 flight hours.
Concerns are growing over air safety in Pakistan. Media in recent years have reported near-misses following overshot runways, engines catching fire and landing gear deployment failures.
- Reuters