33 dead in Mozambican plane crash: Namibia police

A Mozambique Airlines plane carrying 33 people crashed in a remote border area, killing all on board, Namibian media reported Saturday.

The Namibia Press Agency quoted Bollen Sankwasa, a deputy police commissioner, as saying the plane crashed in a national park near the border with Angola and there were no survivors.

The plane was carrying 27 passengers, including 10 Mozambicans, nine Angolans, five Portuguese, and one citizen each from France, Brazil and China, said the airline. Six crew members were on board, it said.

Flight TM470 from Maputo, the Mozambican capital, did not land as scheduled in Luanda, the Angolan capital, on Friday afternoon, and the airline initially said the plane might have landed in Rundu, in northern Namibia. It said it coordinated with aviation authorities in Namibia, Botswana and Angola to locate the missing plane.

A Namibian police helicopter joined officers on the ground in the search. The area is vast and there are no roads, making it difficult to locate the plane, said police official Willy Bampton, according to the Namibian Press Agency.

The search was conducted in the Bwabwata National Park in northeastern Namibia. Several thousand people as well as elephants, buffalo and other animals live in the park, which covers 6,100 sq. km.