Teenager rescued from Yemeni plane crash could not swim
(01 July 2009)A 14-year-old girl is the only known survivor from the Yemeni aircraft that plunged into the Indian Ocean on Monday with 153 passengers on board.
Baya Bakari, from the French city of Marseille, was rescued from the water near the plane wreckage.
The girl, who, according to her father, "can barely swim", was not wearing a life jacket and stayed afloat for 12 hours by gripping onto a piece of the aircraft.
Baya was pulled "shaking" from the Indian Ocean, and is being treated for hypothermia and mild burns at El Maarouf hospital in the Comoros capital Moroni.
It is thought the teenager was ejected from the plane before it hit the water and so avoided the full impact of the crash.
Baya was travelling from Paris to the Comoros Islands with her mother, who did not survive.
Speaking on French radio, her father, Kassim Bakari, described his eldest daughter as a "very very shy girl".
He said: "I never thought she would make it. It is God's will that she survived."
Mr Bakari is blaming the tragedy on the "trash" planes of Yemenia Airways used between the Yemini capital Sanaa and the Comoros Islands.
In 2007, French officials banned the Airbus jet currently serving the Sanaa to Moroni leg due to safety concerns.
French Transport Minister Dominique Bussereau said this model was found to have "a number of faults".
One of the flight recorders from the Yemeni aircraft has been located and attempts to recover the black box, which should hold information on why the plane crashed, will begin today.
French speakers can listen to Kassim Bakari talking of his daughter's experience on French radio channel RTL.
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