French court charges Yemenia airline for fatal 2009 crash

A French court is pursuing Yemen's national carrier "Yemenia" for involuntary manslaughter after one of its Airbus A310-300 planes crashed while landing in the Comoros Islands on June 30, 2009, radio reports said Wednesday. The Yemenia flight was taking many migrant passengers who lived in France home for vacation in Comoros when it fell from the sky in reported bad weather near Moroni. Only a young boy among the 153 passengers survived the crash which Yemenia blamed on weather. A number of the passengers had French nationality. "France Info" radio said that a court here in November charged Yemenia for responsibility for the plane crash because of the poor condition and age of the A310 carrier, which was found previously to have problems. The passengers had originally left Paris for Sanaa on a more modern aircraft before being switched to the doomed plane for the last leg of the flight.