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Two years later, Nigeria yet to investigate air crash

Other News Materials 13 February 2008 01:29 (UTC +04:00)

( dpa ) - More than two years after a Boeing 737 passenger plane crashed in Nigeria, the country's accident bureau Tuesday accused police of holding up an investigation into the cause of the crash.

The plane, belonging to a local airline, Bellview, disappeared from the radar minutes after take-off from Lagos in Nigeria's southwest, on its way to Abuja, on October 23, 2005.

The plane killed all 116 passengers and crew on board.

Samuel Oduselu, commissioner of the Accident Investigation Bureau, said the Nigerian police claimed they retrieved the black box of the aircraft shortly after the crash, but had yet to hand it over to the accident bureau.

"The black box, the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder are important components in an aircraft," he said.

Those items would enable investigators determine "what went wrong and what happened" during the flight.

"The police said they found the recorder and we have been writing to them. Up to now, they cannot tell us the one they found, where it is and to whom they gave it," he said.

"The police has no business holding the two components."

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