FALLEN ANGELS
Ethiopian Airlines crash – At least nine Britons killed including UN animal campaigner, polar expert, aid worker and dad of three
AT least nine Britons were among the 157 killed in the Ethiopian Airlines plane crash, the Foreign Office confirmed this evening.
They include a UN animal campaigner, a polar tourism expert, an aid worker, a dad-of-three from Hull and a mother and son.
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Four countries including China ordered airlines to temporarily ground their Boeing 737 Max 8 planes over safety fears following the Sunday morning crash.
Both the cockpit voice recorder and the digital flight data recorder have been recovered - as a witness said the jet churned out smoke as it went down.
The toll of British victims was revised up from an earlier figure of seven to nine on Monday.
The Foreign Office said: "We can now sadly confirm at least nine British nationals were on board flight ET302.
"Our staff at the British Embassy in Addis Ababa are continuing to work with the relevant authorities in Ethiopia to obtain further information.
"We extend our deepest condolences to all those who have lost loved ones and those affected by this tragic event."
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The latest Brit victim to be named is Sam Pegram, 25, from Penwortham, Lancashire, who worked for the Norwegian Refugee Council and was on his way to Nairobi.
His mum Deborah told the : "Sam was so looking forward to going to Nairobi. He loved the work he was doing.
"We can't believe this has happened. We're totally devastated."
British-Somali mother and son Sahra Hassan Said and Nasrudin Abdulkadir were also named as among those on board the Boeing 737 Max 8 when it crashed soon after taking off from Bole International Airport in Addis Ababa.
Fellow passengers Joanna Toole, 36, from Devon, and University of Plymouth graduate Sarah Auffret were both on their way to a UN conference in Nairobi.
It is understood Joanna was going to conduct a workshop with fishermenon behalf of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation.
Her heartbroken dad revealed he was always terrified of her frequent flying for work.
Adrian Toole said: "Joanna was a very soft and loving person.
"She had never really wanted to do anything else but work in animal welfare since she was a child.
"Joanna's work was not a job - it was her vocation.
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He added: "Somehow that work took her into the international sphere and for the last 15 years she has been working for international animal welfare organisations.
"That involves a lot of travelling around the world - although personally I never wanted her to be on a single one of those planes."
Ms Auffret is understood to have been travelling to Nairobi to discuss tackling plastic pollution at the UN assembly.
She had British and French dual citizenship, and was an environmental agent who worked for Association of Arctic Expedition Cruise Operators.
Her employers said: "Words cannot describe the sorrow and despair we feel. We have lost a true friend and beloved colleague."
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Joseph Waithaka, 55, has also been named among the victims.
He lived in Hull for ten years before he moved back to Kenya in 2015, although his wife and children are still in Britain.
His Ben Kuria said:
"It is really surreal as he was in my flat just a few hours before and we were having a meal together.
“It is jolting and I am still in shock to be honest. It happened thousands of miles away and I am still trying to make sense of everything."
“He came to my flat in London on Saturday night on his way to Heathrow from Hull and we had a meal together.
"He called me later to say he had boarded his flight at 8pm and I said ‘see you later’.
“When I woke up on Sunday I saw a message on my news app about the airline crash and I quickly put two and two together."
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Irish engineer and aid worker Michael Ryan was among the seven dead from the UN's World Food Programme, a Rome-based humanitarian organisation.
His projects have included creating safe ground for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh and assessing the damage to rural roads in Nepal which were blocked by landslides.
The married father-of-two's mother Christine said he "wanted to save the world".
She told RTE: "His wife and children are just devastated.
"He was a very enthusiastic person, he had a great vision and he believed in engineering and in putting people first."
Michael's colleagues Pilar Buzzetti, Virginia Chimenti and Paolo Ten were also named among the dead.
Russian model Ekaterina Polyakova and her husband Alexander Polyakov, both 28, were killed on their way to a dream holiday in Kenya.
They looked anxious in a selfie video posted as they waited to board their connecting flight in Addis.
Friend Daria Malysheva, said: "They were so young, and so full of plans for their lives. We can’t believe that the guys have gone like this.
"I can’t imagine what’s happening to their parents now."
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Where were the victims from?
The Ethiopian Airlines plane that crashed today was carrying passengers from more than 30 countries, the airline's CEO told journalists.
He said they included 32 Kenyans, 18 Canadians, nine Ethiopians, eight Italians, eight Chinese citizens, eight Americans, seven British citizens, seven French citizens, six Egyptians, five Dutch citizens, four Indians, four people from Slovakia, three Austrians, three Swedes, three Russians, two Moroccans, two Spaniards, two Poles and two Israelis.
Belgium, Ireland Indonesia, Somalia, Norway, Serbia, Togo, Mozambique, Rwanda, Sudan, Uganda and Yemen each had one citizen onboard.
Four of those onboard were listed as using United Nations passports and their nationalities were not immediately clear.
The flight came down six minutes after taking off from Addis Ababa carrying 149 passengers from 35 countries and eight crew members.
Ethiopian Airlines boss Tewolde Gebremariam visited the crash site, where debris is scattered around a crater as big as a basketball court near Bishoftu, 31 miles south of the capital.
He said the dead also include eight Americans, eight Italians, 32 Kenyans, nine Ethiopians, eight Chinese, seven French, 18 Canadians, six Egyptians, five from the Netherlands, and four each from India and Slovakia.
Mr Gerbremariam said the pilot, who had an "excellent flying record", had reported difficulties and asked to turn back, adding the plane had "no known technical problems".
Senior captain Yared Getachew had a "commendable performance" having completed more than 8,000 hours in the air, an Ethiopian Airlines spokesman said.
The plane had flown from Johannesburg to Addis earlier on Sunday morning.
It was delivered new to the airline about four months ago, and underwent "rigorous" testing on February 4.
This is the second major crash involving a Boeing 737 Max 8 jet in less than five months after the Lion Air crash in the sea off Jakarta in October.
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FlightRadar data shows an Ethiopian Airlines plane crashing minutes after take off
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