Plane crash: All 121 on board killed

A Cypriot airliner ploughed into a hill north of Athens today, killing all 121 people on board, Greek officials said.

Reports said the pilots were unconscious when the plane went down, possibly because of a lack of oxygen in the cabin.

The Helios Airways flight HCY 522 was headed from Larnaca, Cyprus, to Athens International Airport when it crashed at about 12.20pm (9.20am Irish time) near the coastal town of Grammatiko, about 25 miles north of the Greek capital.

The Boeing 737 was due to fly onto Prague, Czech Republic, after stopping in Athens.

Fire chief Christos Smetis said there were no survivors among the 115 passengers and six crew on board the plane. ”The fire is still burning and there are no survivors.”

The cause of the crash was unclear, but first indications were that it was apparently due to some type of technical problem – possibly decompression.

A spokesman for the Cyprus government said in Nicosia that there were no signs it was a terrorist attack.

Greece’s Alpha television channel said that Greek air force officials reported that the pilots of two F-16 jet fighters that intercepted the plane over the Aegean Sea shortly before it crashed saw one of the pilots slumped unconscious over the controls. They also reported that there was no movement in the cabin.

Sotiris Voutas, a cousin of one of the passengers on the plane, told Alpha that he received a text message from the cousin on his mobile phone minutes before the crash.

“He told me the pilots were unconscious ... he said: ”Farewell, cousin, here we’re frozen.”

Greek state television quoted Cyprus Transport Minister Haris Thrasou as saying the plane had problems with decompression in the past.

The only piece of the plane that remained intact was the tail section of the jet and debris was strewn in a chasm and surrounding hills. The tail was resting on a dirt road, the wreckage was strew over the hill and into the ravine.

Bits of flesh, clothing, and luggage were scattered around the wreckage, which also started brush fires around the area.

Rescue helicopters flew overhead and firefighting planes swooped low to extinguish some of the fires. Fire trucks and ambulances crowded the roads near the crash site and dark black smoke could be seen rising from various sites around the crash. A number of black-robed Greek Orthodox Christian were also on the scene.

Rescue officials were also looking for the plane’s two black boxes, two orange-coloured devices that record data from the plane and the voices of the pilots in the cockpit. They are designed to survive crashes.

“The Helios flight that crashed in the Athens area left Larnaca and was headed for Athens. The causes of the crash are not known,” government spokesman Theodoros Roussopoulos said.

Rescue workers and residents on the scene said they had not found any survivors.

“There is wreckage everywhere. I am here, things here are very difficult, they are indescribable,” Grammatiko Mayor George Papageorgiou said. “I am looking at back tail. The fuselage has been destroyed. It fell into a chasm and there are pieces. All the residents are here trying to help.”

The head of the Greek airline safety committee, Akrivos Tsolakis, described it as the “worst accident we’ve ever had”.

He speculated that there may have been a problem with the cabin pressure.

“There apparently was a lack of oxygen, which is usually the case when the cabin is de-pressurised,” Tsolakis said.

The two F-16 fighter jets were scrambled shortly after the plane entered Greek air space over the Aegean Sea and did not respond to radio calls. It is standard Greek air force procedure to intercept any aircraft entering the country’s airspace that do not respond to radio calls.

Helios Airways was founded in 1999 as Cyprus’ first independent airline.

It operates a fleet of Boeing 737 jets to cities including London; Athens; Sofia, Bulgaria; Dublin, Ireland; and Strasbourg, France.