84 bodies of PIA plane crash victims handed over to families: CM Murad

KARACHI: Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on Monday said that at least 84 bodies of the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) plane crash victims have been identified and handed over to their families, ARY News reported.

CM Murad in a statement said that out of the total, 84 bodies have been identified so far. He maintained that of the 84 bodies, 45 has been identified through DNA tests.

Murad further said that 13 bodies have been kept in different morgues and their identification process was underway. “9 bodies have been kept in Edhi morgue while 4 in Chippa morgue,” he said.

Meanwhile, the visiting team of French experts that arrived here on May 26 to extend assistance in the PIA plane crash (PK-8303) probe returned to France on Monday morning upon completion of their task.

The French team along with two members of the Pakistani Aircraft Accident and Investigation Board boarded a Paris-bound flight at Jinnah International Airport, Karachi. They also took the ill-fated plane’s black box and cockpit voice recorder with them to begin work on decoding them.

Read More: Technical work on plane’s black box to begin on June 2

France’s Bureau of Enquiry and Analysis for Civil Aviation Safety (BEA) in a tweet on Saturday said, “the mission on site is about to be completed”.

It said: “technical work on FDR and CVR” of the ill-fated aircraft would begin in France on June 2.”

Except for two survivors, all 97 passengers and crew members of the aircraft that crashed into a residential area near Karachi airport were confirmed dead. However, no resident of the Model Colony’s Jinnah Garden, where the plane crashed, was among the deceased.