China Crash: Identities of 134 victims discovered via DNA

Topnaija.NG had earlier reported that China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737 plane carrying 132 people had crashed in Teng county, Wuzhou, Guangxi, and caused a mountain fire.

The Boeing 737 aircraft, which departed from Kunming in Yunnan Province for Guangzhou in Guangdong Province, crashed in Tengxian County of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region on March 21.

It was disclosed during an official news conference on Monday that the identities of 132 victims of the passenger jet that crashed in South-West China last week Monday, have been known via DNA testing by the Chinese authorities.

He said that 20 DNA experts had conducted DNA testing and analysis of the samples, and the identity of the final victim was confirmed on Monday morning.

Meanwhile, public security authorities across the 20 provincial-level regions had been mobilized to identify the victims by collecting DNA samples of those on board and their relatives, said an official with the Ministry of Public Security, Liu Kaihui.

It was also learnt that China, hitherto, had enjoyed an enviable air safety record in recent years in a country crisscrossed by newly built airports and serviced by new airlines established to match the country’s breakneck growth over the last few decades.

A Henan Airlines flight crashed in North-Eastern Heilongjiang province in 2010, killing at least 42 out of 92 people on board although the final toll was never confirmed, and it was the last Chinese commercial passenger flight crash that caused civilian casualties.