Yesterday, we shared the very sad news of the Lufthansa-operated German Plane ‘Germanwings‘ that crashed yesterday leaving 144 passengers and 6 crew members dead. Click here if you missed it. According to updated reports from New York Times, German famed opera duo, Maria Radner and Oleg Bryjak with their baby were among the casualties in the Germanwings plane crash yesterday and also, one of the black boxes has been retrieved from the crash site.
The husband and wife performer were both traveling back to Dusseldorf with their infant after a string of opera performances at the Gran Teater del Liceu in Barcelona, Spain. Their infant was one of the 2 babies traveling on board.
Among other passengers in the plane were 16 German school students and 2 teachers returning from an exchange program in Spain.
According to New York Times, two employees of Delphi, an American automotive company; and at least one employee of Bayer, a German chemical company, were also among the passengers, according to Spanish news reports. Two Australians, a mother and adult son from Victoria, died in the crash, said Australia’s foreign minister, Julie Bishop.
Most of the passengers were Germans, as reported in New York Times. At El Prat Airport outside Barcelona, dozens of relatives were kept in a waiting area, attended to by psychologists and protected by the police.
President Barrack Obama has also sent his condolences and has called the leaders of Germany, Spain and France to express his sadness over the tragedy.
President François Hollande of France, standing with King Felipe VI of Spain, who was in Paris for a state visit, warned that access to the crash site would be very difficult. The French National Assembly in Paris observed a minute of silence to grieve for the tragedy.
“We must feel grief because this is a tragedy that happened on our soil,” Mr. Hollande said.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed sorrow over the incident with the following message :
“I feel terribly sorry because so many people died in this disaster,” she said. “Our thoughts and prayers are with these people.” Ms. Merkel said she would fly to southern France on Wednesday to meet the authorities there.
Heike Birlenbach, the vice president of Lufthansa, which is the owner of Germanwings also said:
“At this stage, we consider this to be an accident,” adding that everything else was speculation.
This is such a saddening news. May God comfort the family of the deceased and may their souls rest in perfect peace.
