A plane carrying the Archbishop of Amsterdam, the Netherlands, Jos Punt, and several other passengers to Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa made an emergency landing in the Croatian city of Dubrovnik today after the pilots detected smoke in one of the aircraft’s engines.
RKK reported that Bishop Jos Punt of Haarlem-Amsterdam, Deacon Fennis, and diocese spokesman Wim Peeters were heading for Ethiopia to attend the Baptism of the Lord (Timket).
According to Peeters the airplane made a few loops over the Adriatic Sea and the pilot then decided to make an emergency landing in Croatia. The pilot had “two of the four engines off. Therefore it seemed as if we were floating. Everyone held his breath. We obviously have said some prayers.
The trio arrived Wednesday morning in Addis Ababa. The Catholics were at the so-called Timket celebrations, the Ethiopian version of the commemoration of the baptism of Christ.
Bishop Punt, Fennis and traveling press secretary will fly later this week to Kenya to visit a number of projects run by the diocese.
12 thoughts on “Plane heading to Ethiopia makes emergency landing”
glad nothing bad happen
I suppose the BIG guy upstairs was sending amessage to them. Weyane’s priest is a freedom fighter and he has killed few preists and few Ethiopian soldiers to earn his patriarkship. The man is not a priest, he is an imposter.
News doesn’t say to which Airline the aircraft belonged.To the best of my knowledge,however,ETHIOPIAN,currently doesn’t operate a four engined jet aircraft on that route or anywhere else.All the jet aircrafts at its disposal are twin engined starting from the 737 to the new triple seven.By the way,coming January 25 is going to be one year anniversary since we lost our people in the flight 409,Boeing 737 that crashed in the Meditranean sea right after takeoff.The results of the investigation as to what caused the disaster has not yet been released.
Hopefully,we will not be told that the accident is caused by “pilot error and spatial disorientation”like the Kenyan Airways flight 507 in the same type of aircraft that crashed in Cameroun in May 2007.Nonetheless,we should not be touchy if the outcome of the investigation concludes pilot error as the cause for the accident.We should brace ourselves that despite our national carrier’s best safety record,it too has its own few skeletons.In countries where free press with professionalism is excercised,inquiries into these sort of disasters are explored without fear or favour.In our case,it’s made a hush-hush story,especially if it involves an individual or institution we have come to regard to the point of worship.Incidentally,the pilot-in-command of the doomed flight 409,Captain Habtamu,-may he rest in peace-was my friend.We used to have good times in the Afar region whenever he was there to dust chemical on cotton farm as a spray pilot.As I was also traveling to the region frequently on another business,we used to link up in the same guest house.He was an intelligent man who had enthusiasm for his career in the aviation industry.Still,for reasons not clear to my layman mind,he crashed in his spray aircraft several years ago while I was there.He survived the mishap without a scratch.To the best of my recollection,this hasn’t been mentioned anywhere.Of course,the incident in the spray aircraft might have nothing to do with the latter fatal accident.After all,I know someone closest to me who had once recorded a crash in his career yet was not only a best pilot but also was a best instructor pilot.The other pilot who crashed with him is still alive and has been known for his excellent career as a fighter pilot in super sonic jets and instructor.He’s Brg.General Techane Mesfin.Reason I brought all these up is because this news provoked my memory as to how agitated most of us were when the Lebanese insinuated that it was a pilot error.Notwithstanding the Lebanese’s crude way of speculating,we should nevertheless not rule out that the results of the investigation could point its finger to human error of our own professionals.Let my prediction on the results of the investigation be a wrong one,a very very wrong one.There!I said it what I have always been thinking in private.And please those of you who love Ethiopia and are also proud of the Airline as I do,do not blow a gasket over my DEFAR prediction.We should learn to face facts,even ugly ones.
Why is this that important
Thank God the passengers and the crew are safe.
Kiflu Hussain,
I wonder if you are Spying for Beirut Officials. You are not a true Ethiopian. For me it seems that you are supporting what they have already said. And beleive me that you are not predicting the result will will be due to Human error, according to Lebanon officials its has been said it from the very early time of the crush. And they have been forcasting several times since the crush that blam is due capt Habtamu. And offcourse they are waiting for the coming 5 days to release the usual news. So please if you feel that you are predicting, you are mistaken. It has been written in many websites that the Lebanon officials has concluded regarding the cause of the crush as if it happend due to human error (http://www.ethiopian-news.com/ethiopian-airlines-flight-409-crash-probe-report-imminent/). I am quite sure even you never know the capt, let alone you were his close friend. Let We say that he was your friend, but why do u need to bring this un-necessary idea to a public website. It seems that you are providing more info to those who rule out the real causes of the crush but balming the very exprienced pilot.
Anyways for your info, eventhough the officials in beirut will release their final investigation result, the reality is that the independent commite who is supposed to release the result has not yet finalized its investigation. They have just completed data collection, which is the first stpe of the investigation process. However, the lebonaon officials has been ruling out terrerisom and wheather conditions as source of the crush. But beleive me the reality is not human error……..
Ever since the miraculous landing of the New York plane incident, whenever I hear about plane crash, the first person that comes to mind is Captain Sullyberger. How did he manage to land his plane with no engine in the river? How come our pilot in the Comoro Island (some fifteen years ago) did not do as good of a job as an American pilot, Sullyberger? Those are the questions that come up to my mind. Good thing that no one was harmed in this incident.
It was Lufthansa, my parents were on that flight. They were pretty stressed out but after several hours tha plane was changed and they reached Addis Ababa.
I have read an article that Boeing company since it has been making planes in China and outsourcing jobs away from America, the quality has fallen. Boeing is now selling these defected planes to gullible buyer and which Ethiopia was one of them which bought recently planes. If this was the old days where Ethiopian ground technicians were the most excellent in the region of Africa and Europe, they would have done a great job of fixing the problem before strting the service. unfortunatley they gound technicians are amateurs hired not by merit but by being Weyane’s ethnic group and therfore, the quality of technicians has decreased.
Was it that it was the Dude Dutch central Intelligence Agency over speeding and rushing over to Ethiopia for the purpose of stand by and picking up the prime Minister just in case the Tunisian style Tsunami start shaking the already over shaky Ethiopian grounds including the areas around Menelik’s palace?
Just like I suspected that I would be opening a can of worms by recalling the tragic incident of ETHIOPIAN crash last year,I see some response–some abusive and some uninformed.Leaving the abusive ones to the owners of vulgar mentality,I would try to inform the uninformed ones,provided they are uninformed out of “innocence”and lethargy but not out of malice.So I say the following to Bekele.
Just like Captain Chesley “Sully”Sullenberger,Captain Leul Abate too showed an excellent airmanship by ditching his aircraft in the Comoros Island thereby saving lives.In fact his feat in saving lives of the passengers was more heroic than the American pilot.While Captain Sullenberger had a problem after six minutes of flight right after takeoff due to a flock of bird strikes,Captain Leul had to confront deranged hijackers for hours thousands of feet up in the sky.The hijackers who were impervious to reason not only fought with him and his co-pilot Yonas Mekuria.They also tampered with his cockpit control while he was attempting to make an emergency landing at Prince Said Ibrahim International Airport on Grande Comore whereby he lost his “visual point of reference”leaving him unable to locate the airport.Other reports in fact suggested that Captain Leul at this time was struggling by himself without his co-pilot who was alleged to be beaten badly by the hijackers.Finally,when the aircraft run out of fuel which was dubbed as “fuel starvation”by aviation speak,he successfully ditched the aircraft in the Comoros Island thereby saving lives.The ones who died, according to Wikipedia and other sources, was because they disregarded Leul’s warning not to “inflate their life jackets inside the aircraft.”Their failure to heed the warning “caused them to be pushed against the ceiling of the fuselage by the inflated life jackets when water flooded in.This,in turn,disabled them to escape thereby causing their drown.It was estimated that 60-80 passengers died while presumably strapped to their seats.Therefore,despite being subjected to immense psychological strain for hours,Cpatain Leul managed to save lives for which he had been awarded by the Flight Safety Foundation for his cool and exemplary professionalism along with his co-pilot,the then First Officer Yonas Mekuria now Captain.
to Kiflu Hussie,
This website and others are filled with emotion driven people. So, don’t waste time to respond, just say your mind and leave it for their consciousness.
What Bekele forgot is we are dealing with precious human lives. If there is any safety issue, the people have a right supposedly to know it. Without transparency we will remain incompetitive. I know Ethiopian is a good name but if it was indeed due to some incompetent pilot then we deserve to know. Otherwise, I may have second thought next time to put my money and my life under this situation along with my kids. Agais, Ethiopian I hope is as we know it lives upto the standard which has been my view. Anyways, I urge Ethiopian to put highly trained pilot on board and if they had a crash it has to be carefully evaluated, One time crash may not tell us about any person’s skill but I don’t know what the regulations are as to how much tolerance te airlines has in general. Clearly, previous crashes send a red telling sign.