Comoros police official: Toddler rescued alive from Airbus 310 crash off Indian Ocean island

Comoros: Child rescued alive in Airbus 310 crash

CAIRO — A Comoros police official says a child has been rescued alive from the sea in the Airbus 310 crash off the Indian Ocean island.

Immigrations officer with the Comoros operations, Rachida Abdullah, says a toddler was rescued from the crash site Tuesday.

Abdullah told The Associated Press that three bodies have also been retrieved, along with debris from the plane, but that no other survivors have been recovered so far.

She said the rescue and search operation is going on since 4 a.m. Tuesday.

The Yemeni Airbus 310 crashed with 142 passengers and a crew of 11 Yemenis on board before landing in Moroni, on the main island of Grand Comore, early on Tuesday.

Most of the passengers were from Comoros, returning from Paris. Sixty-six on board were French nationals.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.

PARIS (AP) — France’s transport minister says French aviation inspectors found a “number of faults” during a 2007 inspection of a plane that has crashed in the Indian Ocean.

The passenger jet from Yemen with 153 people on board crashed Tuesday as it tried to land during heavy wind on the island nation of Comoros.

Dominique Bussereau said on France’s i-Tele television Tuesday that the Airbus A310 was inspected by France’s civil aviation agency DGAC in 2007 and “they noticed a certain number of faults.”

He says the plane had not returned to French air space since.

He says the airline was not on any European black lists but “was subject to stricter surveillance on our part” and was scheduled for an upcoming interview with European Union safety officials.