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16 students and teachers onboard tragic Germanwings Flight 4U9525 were almost not on the doomed plane.
“This is certainly the darkest day in the history of our city,” said Bodo Klimpel, the mayor of Haltern am See, the students’ hometown in northwestern Germany.
“The city is deeply saddened … Everyone is in a state of shock. It is the worst thing you can imagine.”
“The teenagers and their two teachers had been on a week-long exchange trip to Spain, and their names were on the passenger manifest of the doomed Germanwings flight,” Mr Klimpel told a news conference, fighting back tears.
[fwdevp preset_id=”8″ video_path=”ifR7AgaO3C0″]Outside their school, fellow students lit candles and laid flowers for the victims, who were 10th graders studying Spanish.
French officials said there were no survivors among the 144 passengers and six crew aboard the Germanwings Airbus 320 jet when it crashed en route from Barcelona to Duesseldorf near the ski resort of Barcelonnette.
Mr Klimpel said that, although rescue crews had not yet reached the crash site in a remote area of the French Alps, “we have to assume the worst”.
“The relatives are being cared for by specialists, by counsellors and psychologists, and of course our thoughts are with the victims and their loved ones.”
French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said a black box had been found on Tuesday.
“A black box was found and will be delivered to investigators,” Cazeneuve told reporters.
“This black box will be used in the coming hours, it will allow the investigation to move forward. In the meantime, the accident zone is secured.”
He also said the government would do its best to bring families of the victims to the site if they wished to come.
Agencies/Canadajournal
