Ethiopians hold mass funeral ceremony for crash victims
Posted March 17, 2019 3:39 am.
Last Updated March 17, 2019 4:30 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — Thousands of Ethiopians have turned out to a mass funeral ceremony in the capital one week after the plane crash that killed 157 people.
Some victims’ relatives fainted and fell to the ground during the procession through Addis Ababa on Sunday. Seventeen empty caskets were laid to rest in a remembrance of the victims from Ethiopia.
The service came one day after officials began delivering bags of scorched earth to family members of the victims instead of the remains of their loved ones because the identification process is expected to take such a long time.
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Forensic DNA work has begun on identifying the remains but it may take six months because the body parts are in small pieces but authorities say they will issue death certificates within two weeks.
“The soil came as it became impossible to identify bodies and hand over remains to family members,” one family member said. “We will not rest until we are given the real body or body parts of our loved ones.”
The victims came from 35 countries, including 18 Canadians.
Many families have held religious ceremonies and the grieving also have gathered at the rural, dusty crash site outside Ethiopia’s capital.
In Paris, investigators started studying the cockpit voice recorder of the crashed Ethiopian Airlines jet on Saturday.
The Associated Press
