Worst crash in a decade kills 228 on Air France jet

Rio-Paris Flight Plunges Into Atlantic After Lightning Hit

Paris: An Air France jet carrying 228 people from Rio de Janeiro to Paris crashed into the Atlantic Ocean on Monday after suffering an electrical failure in a fierce storm.
    Air France said the Airbus A330-200 jet was probably hit by lightning. The Brazilian and French air forces sent out planes to scour a vast area of ocean, but officials held out little hope of finding survivors.
    If, as expected, it's confirmed that all 228 people were killed it would mark the worst loss of life in Air France's history and would rank as civil aviation's worst accidental disaster in more than a decade.
    French environment and transport minister Jean-Louis Borloo said hijacking had been ruled out and that the plane had probably had some kind of accident. "There's nothing on Spanish radar, nothing on Moroccan radar, nothing on French radar. We can seriously envisage the worst,'' Borloo said.
    "There are mainly Brazilians, between 40 and 60 French and 25 Germans on the files we have so far collected,'' he said, breaking down the nationalities of the missing passengers.
    Separately, officials from other countries said it was believed that there were six Danes, five Italians, three Moroccans, two Lebanese, two Slovaks and a Portuguese among the passengers.
    Air France said that among the 216 passengers, there were 126 men, 82 women, seven children and a baby. The crew was made up of 12 members, including nine cabin crew, it added. AGENCIES

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