Tuesday 5 March 2013

Bodies of Egyptian balloon crash victims identified, return to Japan


The bodies of the four Japanese tourists that were killed in the hot air balloon crash in Egypt last week returned to Japan on Monday, arriving at Narita International Airport. The four victims, two married couples, each in their 60s, were accompanied by nine relatives who flew to Egypt last week in order to confirm their identities.

The identities of the victims have been released, with both couples coming from Tokyo: 66 year old Kazuo Tsuge, the chairman of a transport company that specialized in moving racehorses, and his wife, Harumi, 63. The others were Yasuhide Terada and his wife Asako, both 63. Their relatives traveled to Cairo on Thursday, February 28th in order to view the bodies in a local morgue, as well as visit some of the tourists spots, like the Great Pyramid of Giza, last visited by the victims before the accident that killed 19 people in total.

On Tuesday, February 26th, a hot air balloon carrying 21 people, including its pilot, caught fire and fell to the ground in the city of Luxor, a popular tourist spot. Two people managed to survive by jumping from the basket when it was still at a low altitude, before the fire caused the balloon to soar. Recent years have other balloon accidents within Egypt’s tourism industry, resulting in the questioning of safety standards and the government to call for an investigation into the accident.

Monday 4 March 2013

http://japandailypress.com/bodies-of-egyptian-balloon-crash-victims-identified-return-to-japan-0524513

0 comments:

Post a Comment