Aridi: No Official Announcement Yet and Sabotage Ruled Out

Public Works and Transport Minister Aridi held a press conference at Beirut International Airport on updates concerning the Ethiopian plane that crashed into the Lebanese waters on the 25th of January 2010.

Aridi during the press conference thanked all airport staff and tower control employees who were working during the Ethiopian plane crash. He handed over the control tower staff letters of praise for their good performance on January 25.

"The employees have preserved Lebanon's reputation in ensuring the safety of all those arriving at or departing from the airport." He said.

Aridi reiterated that all those working on this case should safeguard the secrecy and transparency of the investigation.

In the conference, Aridi ruled out the possibility of sabotage leading to the crash of the plane. He assured that in case an explosion took place, the airplane and travelers would have been shredded into pieces and scattered on large scales of the Lebanese waters. But according to military official sources, the fuselage and bodies are being retrieved from one zone and at low depth.

On finding the second black box, Aridi said "Yesterday, we announced that we have found the [second] black box, and this is true. When the investigation committee announced that there was a part missing from the second black box that too was true." He stated that the part of the black box went missing due to the severity of the crash.

Moreover, he declared that the Lebanese army is still searching for the missing part and search operations for more bodies are still underway, declaring the area of search operations as off-limits.

But he said that some of the plane parts were kept in their place. All the parts will be retrieved only if the insurance company wants that and asks Ethiopian Airlines for their recovery.

Despite the fact that the first black box contained 1,000 data units, Aridi said no official announcement could be made unless the entire second black box was found.

"We cannot officially announce anything until we find the missing parts of the black box and analyze it."