A domestic flight carrying 17 passengers and two pilots crashed in Suriname yesterday morning killing all on board.
The Antonov 28, owned by Blue Wing Airline which also operates a scheduled service out of Guyana crashed just 1800 meters away from landing at an airstrip in the gold mining town of Benzdorp in the interior of the country close to the French Guiana border.
Reuters in a report last evening on the incident said that concerns over the airline’s safety standards had prompted restrictions on the carrier flying into neighbouring French Guiana. However that report said those restrictions were lifted last year.
Reports out of Suriname indicate that the aircraft was scheduled for touchdown at 11 am, Suriname time [10 am local time] and had already prepared for landing but was forced to suddenly pull back up since another plane was on the runway. Reports also indicate that the plane did not generate enough power for the sudden elevation and hit a tree, causing it to explode.
Emergency teams including military troops and police as well as a privately owned emergency company were rushed to the crash site, reports said.
Stabroek News was informed that that all the bodies were recovered and flown to the Zorg en Hoop airport at Paramaribo where many government officials were present. Several hundred people including relatives and friends of the victims also flocked the airport, the source added.
Captain Soeriani Jhauw–Verkuyl, 36, who piloted the plane, and was also co-owner of the airline and co-pilot Robert Lackin, 23, were the two names released up to press time last night. This newspaper was told that the names of the others are to be officially released today.
From reports received, none of the persons killed in the accident are Guyanese. This newspaper was told that one of the persons killed was an employee of state owned telecommunication company Telesur while ten others were sub-contractors of the company and the other six persons were regular passengers residing in the area who were returning home.
Blue Wing over the last four to five months has been conducting a regularly scheduled service out of Guyana to Paramaribo. Local airline operator Gerry Gouveia, proprietor of Roraima Airlines said his company manages ground handling for the airline which travels three times a week to Suriname, from Guyana.
The most recent plane crash in Suriname occurred in December 2001, when a two-engine airplane from local Gam Air crashed into a mountainside, killing all 10 people on board, including six Brazilian musicians and a popular Surinamese singer travelling to a carnival celebration, authorities said.
