One passenger is missing after a blast on a commercial
airliner that ripped a hole in its fuselage shortly after take-off from
Somalia’s capital, the airline said Thursday.
“All passengers except one disembarked safely after aircraft
landed at the airport,” Daallo Airlines said in a statement.
“Investigations are underway to ascertain the cause of one missing
passenger.”
Aviation experts and the pilot who landed the plane safely
in Mogadishu after the explosion on Tuesday have said they fear the
blast was a bomb. There has been no official confirmation of the cause
of the explosion.
It was not clear if the missing passenger had been on the
plane and was potentially blown up in the blast — or sucked out through
the ragged hole ripped in the metal — or if there was some miscounting
with the list of those on board.
Photographs showed a large hole — about a metre in diameter — just
above the engines on the right wing, with streaks of soot on the plane.
“Two passengers have been reported to have suffered minor injuries
and they were taken to the hospital for treatment,” Daallo added.
The airline operates flights across Somalia and the wider Horn of Africa and Gulf region.
Somalia’s government has said the blast was believed to be caused by a problem with the air pressure.
“The flight was approximately 15 minutes in the air when the incident
happened which caused a hole in the fuselage,” Daallo added.
The airline said the “incident is currently being investigated” by
the Civil Aviation Authority in Mogadishu, as well as a technical team
from the aircraft’s owners.
The Serbian pilot has said he thought the blast, which ripped the
fuselage from inside to out, had been an explosive device, according to
reports in the Serbian newspaper Blic on Wednesday.
Pilot Vladimir Vodopivec, 64, told a friend he thought it was “a bomb”, without giving more details.
Vodopivec added that the blast did not damage the navigation systems,
and while cabin pressure was lost, he was able to guide the plane back
safely to land at Mogadishu airport.
Aviation safety expert Xavier Tytelman said Wednesday he had compared
images of the blast with photographs of previous explosions, and it had
all the appearances of a bomb.
It was not caused by any issue of pressurisation, he said, for the blast ripped the metal outwards.
