Flights in Amsterdam now to fly over wreckage
Güncelleme Tarihi:
Daily News with wires
Oluşturulma Tarihi: Mart 03, 2009 00:00
ISTANBUL - Flights were set to resume Sunday night on the Amsterdam runway where a Turkish Airlines Boeing 737-800 was supposed to land before it crashed four days ago, killing nine people, while a news Web site reported that Dutch passengers aboard that ill-fated flight are preparing to file a lawsuit.
The runway at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport had been closed to all air traffic since Wednesday's crash, which also injured dozens of passengers.
Planes heading to the airport's Polder runway will now fly low over the wreckage of flight TK1951, which slammed into a muddy field 1.5 kilometers short of the runway and broke into three pieces.
Haarlemmermeer Municipality spokesman Remco Asselbergs said flights would resume at 11 p.m. Dutch local time. The runway is one of five at the airport.
Dutch Safety Authority spokesman Fred Sanders said investigators were still examining the wreckage for clues to the cause of the crash.
Possible causes under investigation include turbulence caused by another plane that landed shortly before the crash, weather-related factors, insufficient fuel, loss of fuel, navigational errors, pilot fatigue or bird strikes.
The wreckage is not expected to be removed from the field until Tuesday. Investigators hope to give a preliminary report on the cause of the crash later in the week after completing their analysis of voice and data recordings from the plane's black boxes.
Five Turks and four Americans died in the crash, including three Boeing employees from Washington state.
Asselbergs said 44 survivors were still being treated in 13 different hospitals Sunday and one of them remained in critical condition.
On Saturday, hundreds of mourners gathered outside Turkish Airlines' Istanbul headquarters where Candan Karlıtekin, the head of the company's board of directors, paid tribute to pilots Hasan Tahsın Arısan, Olgay Özgur and Murat Sezer and flight attendant Ulvi Murat Eskin.
Employees threw red carnations on the coffins draped in the red, crescent-and-star Turkish flags as they were being carried away on colleagues and family members' shoulders.
Three crew members were buried in Istanbul following funeral prayers at a mosque. The fourth was taken to his hometown of Bursa, in northwestern Turkey. A fifth Turk who died, businessman Bülent Içgören, had a funeral service Sunday in Istanbul.
It was not immediately clear if the American victims have already been flown home.
Dutch passengers plan to sue
Meanwhile, Dutch passengers aboard flight TK1951 are reportedly preparing to file a lawsuit, but it remains unclear whether the defendant party is Turkey or the Netherlands, said the news site worldbulletin.net yesterday.
Passengers and Netherlands nationals, who survived the accident, set up an Internet site and asked lawyer Lachman Soedamah to pursue their claims.
Soedamah said because the cause of the accident was not determined yet, it is not clear that compensation cases will be accepted against the Netherlands or Turkey.
Planes heading to the airport's Polder runway will now fly low over the wreckage of flight TK1951, which slammed into a muddy field 1.5 kilometers short of the runway and broke into three pieces.
Haarlemmermeer Municipality spokesman Remco Asselbergs said flights would resume at 11 p.m. Dutch local time. The runway is one of five at the airport.
Dutch Safety Authority spokesman Fred Sanders said investigators were still examining the wreckage for clues to the cause of the crash.
Possible causes under investigation include turbulence caused by another plane that landed shortly before the crash, weather-related factors, insufficient fuel, loss of fuel, navigational errors, pilot fatigue or bird strikes.
The wreckage is not expected to be removed from the field until Tuesday. Investigators hope to give a preliminary report on the cause of the crash later in the week after completing their analysis of voice and data recordings from the plane's black boxes.
Five Turks and four Americans died in the crash, including three Boeing employees from Washington state.
Asselbergs said 44 survivors were still being treated in 13 different hospitals Sunday and one of them remained in critical condition.
On Saturday, hundreds of mourners gathered outside Turkish Airlines' Istanbul headquarters where Candan Karlıtekin, the head of the company's board of directors, paid tribute to pilots Hasan Tahsın Arısan, Olgay Özgur and Murat Sezer and flight attendant Ulvi Murat Eskin.
Employees threw red carnations on the coffins draped in the red, crescent-and-star Turkish flags as they were being carried away on colleagues and family members' shoulders.
Three crew members were buried in Istanbul following funeral prayers at a mosque. The fourth was taken to his hometown of Bursa, in northwestern Turkey. A fifth Turk who died, businessman Bülent Içgören, had a funeral service Sunday in Istanbul.
It was not immediately clear if the American victims have already been flown home.
Dutch passengers plan to sue
Meanwhile, Dutch passengers aboard flight TK1951 are reportedly preparing to file a lawsuit, but it remains unclear whether the defendant party is Turkey or the Netherlands, said the news site worldbulletin.net yesterday.
Passengers and Netherlands nationals, who survived the accident, set up an Internet site and asked lawyer Lachman Soedamah to pursue their claims.
Soedamah said because the cause of the accident was not determined yet, it is not clear that compensation cases will be accepted against the Netherlands or Turkey.