An Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 crashed on Sunday morning its way from Addis Ababa to Nairobi with 157 people believed to be on board, Ethiopian Airlines said. Ethiopia’s state broadcaster said there were no survivors.

Ethiopian airline CEO at crash scenes

“We hereby confirm that our scheduled flight ET 302 from Addis Ababa to Nairobi was involved in accident today,” the airline said in a statement

“It is believed that there were 149 passengers and eight crew on board the flight but we are currently confirming the details of the passenger manifest for the flight.”

Broadcaster EBC said there were passengers from 33 countries. According to CCTV, several Chinese were on board.

The foreign ministry in Beijing said on social media that its embassies in Ethiopia and Kenya have started emergency procedures to verify whether any Chinese citizens were on the plane.

The state-owned Ethiopian Airlines, widely considered the best-managed airline in Africa, calls itself Africa’s largest carrier and has ambitions of becoming the gateway to the continent.

Records show the plane was new. According to Planespotters civil aviation database, the Boeing 737-800 MAX was delivered in mid-November.

It would also set up a passenger information centre and a dedicated telephone number for family and friends of people who may have been on the flight.

The Boeing 737-800 MAX is the same type of plane as the Indonesian Lion Air jet that crashed last October, 13 minutes after take-off from Jakarta, killing all 189 people on board.

The last major accident involving an Ethiopian Airlines passenger plane was a Boeing 737-800 that exploded after taking off from Lebanon in 2010, killing 83 passengers and seven crew.

Ethiopian Airlines has been expanding assertively, recently opening a route to Moscow and in January inaugurating a new passenger terminal in Addis Ababa to triple capacity.

Speaking at the inauguration, the prime minister challenged the airline to build a new “Airport City” terminal in Bishoftu – where Sunday’s crash occurred.

Source : southern China morning post in additional press source

The Office of the PM, on behalf of the Government and people of Ethiopia, would like to express it’s deepest condolences to the families of those that have lost their loved ones on Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 on regular scheduled flight to Nairobi, Kenya this morning.

— Office of the Prime Minister – Ethiopia (@PMEthiopia) March 10, 2019