The Ethiopian Ministry of Transport has announced that it has sent an accident investigation team to China to assist with the investigation of the fire that engulfed the Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 777 cargo plane at Shanghai Pudong Airport on Wednesday.
Ethiopian Airlines issued the following update:
Although a proper investigation has been started by the country of occurrence and the country of registration and operation, preliminary information revealed that in the final preparation for taxi out, fire was detected in the main deck. The crew reported to ATC and the handling company and asked for help as per the procedure. Meanwhile, the fire spread in the cabin until the handling company and the airport emergency unit arrived at the scene of the incident. The fire damaged the upper structure of the aircraft before it was brought under control by the airport emergency services.
The aircraft, Boeing B777- 200F with registration ET-ARH was originally dedicated cargo aircraft acquired by Ethiopian Airlines brand new from the Boeing factory in October 2014. The aircraft had a clean maintenance log book since previous flights.
While authorities in China are investigating the cause of the incident, a team of experts has been dispatched from Addis Ababa to assist in the investigation.
