The lone survivor of the 2009 Yemen Airways plane crash off the Comoros will testify in a Paris court on Monday for an airline accused of manslaughter and injury in the crash that killed 152 people.
Bahia Bakary was 12 when she and her mother flew from Paris and Marseille on June 29, 2009 before boarding a plane in Sana’a for a holiday in the Comoros. In the evening, a Yemeni plane crashed in the Indian Ocean while preparing to land in Moroni, the capital of the Comoros, with a crew of 11 and 142 passengers on board.
Bakary survived by clinging to debris at sea for 12 hours before being rescued by fishermen the next day. Since the trial began on May 9, the sole survivor, now 25, has attended several hearings with her father and has refused to speak to the press. The only witness to the incident stated in a book entitled “I am Bahia, a miracle”, published in 2010: “On the night of June 30, 2009, a miracle happened. Death touched me, he took my mother, but you don’t want me.”
‘huge bang’
It said the plane was “more dilapidated” than the first, began to “shake more and more”, and then felt a “powerful electrical discharge” followed by a “powerful explosion”. In the “icy waters” among the “dark waves” I heard “women’s screams” and then fell into a “likeness of a coma”, remaining a “miracle” hanging on a piece of metal.
Bahia Bakary, born in Essonne (near Paris) to Comorian parents on August 15, 1996, suffered broken legs and burns. After her transfer to France, she was visited by the then President of the Republic, Nicolas Sarkozy. The French judiciary immediately opened an investigation, given that 66 French citizens were among the victims, and the trial is taking place in Paris for the same reasons.
Experts concluded that the crash was due to a mix of errors attributed to the pilots, ruling out the hypothesis that the aircraft was hit by a missile or lightning strike or had a technical malfunction. There was “negligence” on the part of the Yemeni airline operating Flight 626: it made a mistake when it continued to operate night flights to Moroni despite old faults in the airport’s lighting systems, in addition to “gaps” in pilot training.
pilot training
The defendants’ seats have been empty since the start of the trial, and not a single company representative was present due to the war in Yemen, the defense said. Aviation experts consistently testified before the judges, noting that the pilots made “disproportionate maneuvers” prior to the crash, based on flight records contained in the ill-fated aircraft’s black boxes. The training of the crew was especially noted, especially taking into account the new expert advice from the defense.
Officials from the Institute of Criminal Investigation of the French National Gendarmerie described the aftermath of the violence resulting from the accident on the bodies, noting that they were difficult to identify as only a fraction of them were found on the coast and on the ocean floor. Monday’s meeting will be broadcast in Marseille, where many passengers have disembarked.
The crash comes just a month after another crash, the crash of an Air France flight between Rio de Janeiro and Paris that killed 228 people, and Airbus and Air France will be heard in the same court in the fall. The trial of the Yemeni company is due to end on June 2.