Cameroon starts probe into air crash, rescue delay

MBANGA PONGO, Cameroon, May 8 (Reuters) Cameroon today opened an inquiry into the crash of a Kenya Airways plane which rescuers took two days to find, and forensic experts began trying to identify the remains of the 114 victims.

Investigators and rescue officials, struggling in knee-deep mud softened by recent rain, pored over the shattered wreckage of the Boeing 737-800, which plunged into swampy jungle minutes after takeoff from Cameroon's second city Douala late on Friday.

The inquiry was expected to focus not only on why the plane, only six months old, came down in stormy weather, but also why rescuers took 48 hours to find the crash site.

''From the end of the runway (to the crash site) it is 5.42 kilometres ... relatively close to Douala airport,'' Kenyan government spokesman Alfred Mutua said in Nairobi.

Search parties and a radar-equipped helicopter had spent the weekend scouring forests in southern Cameroon, 150 km away.

Cameroonian officials have said initial search efforts were based on satellite tracking data from Europe which seemed to put the plane's last position over the forests of south Cameroon.

Celeste Mandeng of Cameroon's Civil Protection Service said investigators would cover all possibilities, including whether the pilot turned back and tried to land again at Douala.

Cameroon Prime Minister Ephraim Inoni ordered Transport Minister Dakole Daissala to lead a formal government inquiry into the crash, which once again threw the spotlight on air safety in Africa, the continent with the world's worst record.

After visiting the crash site near the village of Mbanga Pongo, Kenya Airways Chief Executive Titus Naikuni declined to comment on why it had taken so long to locate the plane.

''Let's not pre-empt the investigation,'' he told reporters.

Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki declared next Monday a national day of mourning for the crash victims.

''APPALLING CONDITIONS'' Naikuni said Kenya Airways was flying in forensic and DNA experts to help identify the remains of the nine crew and 105 passengers -- of more than 20 nationalities -- who were killed.

On the edge of waterlogged jungle surrounding the crash site, white-coated Red Cross workers laid out blackened body parts on white plastic sheets at a makeshift rescue centre.

''After being here for 2-3 days, the remains are in an advanced state of decomposition,'' said Cameroonian psychologist Dr. Luc-Richard Kouoh Dipanda, who was helping relatives.

Some victims' distraught relatives who visited the crash site on Monday had fainted from shock, he said.

''The conditions are absolutely appalling. It took us an hour knee-deep in mud to get to the scene and even longer to get back,'' Acting British High Commissioner to Cameroon Steven Crossman told Reuters.

Mandeng said the flight data recorder ''black box'' had been recovered, but not the cockpit voice recorder.

Reuters SBA VP0042