Plane door, sharks point to possible site of Comoros crash (Roundup)

Jul 3, 2009, 14:36 GMT

Johannesburg - Rescue workers searching for victims of this week's plane crash off the Comoros islands on Friday found what appeared to be a door of the plane as well as a school of sharks possibly indicating the presence of bodies, authorities said.

'They (Comoran, French and US rescue workers) found what looks to be a door from the plane,' a spokesman at the crisis centre in the Comoran capital Moroni confirmed.

'They also found a school of sharks around some debris. They suppose there may be bodies there,' spokesman Ahmed Sast told the German Press Agency dpa.

The door was found and the sharks were spotted in the same stretch of water where the lone survivor of the Yemenia airways crash, a 12-year-old French girl of Comoran origin, was pulled from the water on Tuesday.

So far, no bodies of the remaining 152 people on board have been recovered.

The Comoran government has announced 30 days of mourning for the victims.

President Ahmed Abdallah Sambi announced the mourning period in an address Thursday on national television.

The Airbus A310 plunged into the Indian Ocean off Grande Comore island after missing its first attempt at landing in windy weather in the capital Moroni.

Most of the 142 passengers were Comorans living in France, where the flight originated.

Questions over the plane's safety were raised after it emerged France had barred the aircraft from its airspace over defects it detected in 2007. A newer Airbus was used for the France-Yemen leg.

Yemenia insists the plane was safe.