(What’s left of MH17 – a tragedy that should not have happened in the first place. Image source: BBC)
I did not believe when I first heard about it. It can’t be true. Someone must have made a mistake. Then the news started to trickle in. It was all gloomy and the outcome did not look well.
A Malaysia Airlines jet carrying 295 people has crashed in east Ukraine on a flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.
There are no signs of survivors at the scene of the crash near the village of Grabovo, in rebel-held territory close to the border with Russia.
Both sides in Ukraine’s civil conflict accused each other of shooting down the plane with a missile. It is still not clear why the plane came down.
It is the second disaster suffered by Malaysia Airlines this year. Flight MH370 disappeared en route from Malaysia to China in April and still has not been found.
At a news conference at Schiphol airport, Malaysia Airlines’ European chief Huib Gorter said they were still trying to identify some of the passengers from flight MH17.
He said of the passengers that have been identified there were:
• 154 Dutch nationals, 27 Australians, 23 Malaysians, 11 Indonesians
• Six Britons, four Germans, four Belgians, three from the Philippines and one Canadian
• All 15 of the crew were MalaysianOther airlines have announced they are now avoiding eastern Ukraine.
(Source)
The question that needs an immediate answer is why and who.
Najib rightly had put the view of the nation when he said: “This is a tragic day in what has already been a tragic year for Malaysia”. We have yet to overcome the loss of MH370 and certainly, we do not need another tragedy involving our planes.
My brother in law is certainly in a shock over the loss – he flew on the route quite often and know personally some of the MH17 crew. This has been the second time he had been very lucky by missing out on the 2 routes where MH had gone down.
It certainly has been the case of the plane being at the wrong time and place and unlike MH370, we have the MH17 wreck and to some extent, some kind of closure.
We must find the one who pulled the trigger and make them pay dearly (the case already building upon the pro-Russia rebels as being the main culprits). The lost of 295 passengers and 15 crew members is not a small of a matter to be swept under the carpet and called as collateral damage in the on-going conflict.
It’s a tragic indeed…