Obasanjo seeks air crash answers

Many of the relatives saw the horrendous crash

Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo has ordered airline operators and aviation officials to meet him for talks following Saturday's plane crash.

The plane overshot the runway in Port Harcourt and burst into flame.

More than 100 people, including 70 pupils from the same secondary school, were killed in the crash. Four of the seven survivors have since died.

Information Minister Frank Nweke said Tuesday's meeting would also be attended by members of the public.

This is Nigeria's second air disaster in less than two months.

Mr Obasanjo's spokeswoman said the meeting in the capital, Abuja, would discuss "much-needed reforms in Nigeria's aviation industry".

'Only child'

Investigators have begun sifting through the wreckage of the DC-9 and analysing the flight data recorders after the crash which it is now known killed 106 people.

Clutching photographs, family members have been walking past badly burnt bodies laid out on the mortuary floor at the University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital.

The bodies, which were still identifiable, had been sprinkled with disinfectant and tagged with numbers, in a room with no refrigeration or air-conditioning.

"I just felt like part of my life is gone," said Valentina Chigbo, whose 16-year-old daughter was on the plane.

"She was my only child, she was the centre of everything in my life," she told the AP news agency.

Loopholes

A Catholic Archbishop, John Onaiyekan of Abuja, said 71 pupils from Abuja's Ignatius Loyola Jesuit College died in the crash. Four others had got off the plane during a scheduled stopover in another city, he said.

Many of the pupils' families had been at Port Harcourt's airport to collect their children and witnessed the crash in the capital of Nigeria's main oil-producing region.

NIGERIA PLANE CRASHES December 2005:Sosoliso Airlines plane crashes in Port Harcourt, with more than 100 deaths October 2005: Bellview Airlines plane crashes near the village of Lissa, Ogun state, killing 117 people May 2002: Plane operated by EAS Airlines crashes in Kano, killing 148 people - half of them on the ground November 1996: 142 people die when Boeing 727 owned by Nigeria's ADC airline plunges into lagoon 85km (55 miles) from Lagos September 1992: 158 people are killed when military transport plane goes down near Lagos Air disasters timeline

The victims also included a French and a US national working for aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres.

The privately-run Sosoliso Airlines, which owned the plane, went into operation as a domestic airline in 2000 and now flies to six Nigerian cities.

The president, said to be deeply saddened by the accident, has cancelled a visit to Portugal to deal with the air disaster.

Correspondents say several Nigerian airports have come under criticism in recent months following a string of accidents and near-misses.

A Boeing 737 aircraft crashed in October shortly after take-off from the commercial capital Lagos, killing all 117 people on board.

The flight recorders from that plane were never found.

Mr Obasanjo had instructed his aviation minister to plug any loopholes to ensure airline safety.