The Namibian police confirmed this morning that an Air Mozambique aircraft flying from Maputo to Luanda, missing since Friday afternoon, had indeed crashed. There are no survivors among the 34 occupants of the aircraft, five of the passengers were Portuguese nationals.
The wreckage was found in Bwabwata National Park near the border of Angola and Botswana.
"The plane burned completely and there are no survivors," said the security forces responsible for the area.
The Mozambican Airlines flight was scheduled between Maputo and Luanda and in addition to the five Portuguese passengers, there were ten Mozambicans, nine Angolans, one French national, one Brazilian and one Chinese, according to the airline passenger log.
Six crew members on the Brazilian made Embraer 190, were on board. At a press conference in the early hours of Saturday, the Minister of Transport and Communications of Mozambique, Gabriel Muthisse stated that the plane would have made an emergency landing or had crashed in a forested area in the border region between Namibia and Botswana.
News agency France Presse said on Saturday that the coordinator of the criminal police of Kavango Region, Willie Bampton, reported that locals had seen smoke in an area close to the border with Botswana and villagers had heard explosions.
Bampton added that rescue work is being hampered by the absence of access roads to the site which is in jungle, and the recent heavy rains that have drenched the region.
A Portuguese businessman was among the 28 passengers on the Mozambique Airlines flight. According to a friend of the businessman who was a resident of central Portugal with construction interests in Angola and Mozambique, he was last heard from as he waiting to board the doomed flight on Friday. He was named on Sunday as Sergio Soveral, 38, from Rio Maior who worked in Mozambique and Angola. Seven years ago his father died in a work accident and Soveral took over the reins of Joluso with his sister, providing jobs for 200 workers. He leaves a five year old girl.
