US American Airlines Plane Crash Suspected an Accident

American Airlines Flight 587 bound for the Dominican Republic crashed few minutes after taking off from John F. Kennedy Airport in New York on Nov. 12, killing 260 people on board--251 passengers including 5 children and 9 crew members. The number of deaths supposedly counts at least 266 as 6 to 9 people are missing on ground.

Marion Blakey, chairperson of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), said ``All information we have currently is that this is an accident.`` She added, ``There were no unusual communications in the cockpit even up until a few seconds before the crash.`` The investigation team announced as well, ``That there was an explosion right before the crash indicates that the accident was likely caused by mechanical defects.``

The U.S. aviation authorities recovered one of two black boxes, `the cockpit voice recorder`, and sent it for analysis, and they are now searching for the second black box, the flight data recorder. Federal officials said the flight data recorder would be helpful for finding out the cause of the accident within a few days.

As there is not much possibility of a terrorist attack having caused the accident, the White House announced, ``A summit talk between the U.S. President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin scheduled on Nov. 13 will be proceeding as it was originally planned.`` President Putin left for the United States the afternoon of Nov. 12.

The airplane of the accident crashed on Monday into a residential district of Rockaway in the borough of Queens, 8 kilometers away from John F. Kennedy Airport, three minutes after taking off from the airport at 9:17 AM (11:17 PM Korean Time). The area was clouded with black smoke and flames. A rescue team that went into action right after the crash recovered 265 dead bodies from the wreckage by that night. President Bush expressed his condolences to the family members of the victims.

eligius@donga.com