Bangladesh mourns 31 dead in jet crash as students protest to demand accountability

DHAKA Bangladesh AP Hundreds of students protested near the site of the crash of a Bangladesh air force training jet into a school in the nation s capital demanding accountability compensation for casualties families and the halt of training flights The death toll from the crash rose to on Tuesday including at least students a mentor who died from burn injuries she sustained while helping others get out of the burning building and the pilot of the training aircraft Firefighters further secured the site in Dhaka s densely populated Uttara neighborhood while the military launched an research The country s civil aviation authority was not involved in the inquiry directly Bangladesh declared Tuesday a day of national mourning with the flags flying at half-staff across the country Monday s crash at the Milestone School and College caused a fire that gutted the two-story school building Representatives explained people mostly students and multiple with burns were rescued and carried away in helicopters ambulances motorized rickshaws and in the arms of firefighters and parents The protesting students demanded accurate publication of identities of the dead and injured compensation for their families and an immediate halt to the use of outdated and unsafe training aircraft by the Bangladesh air force They chanted slogans and accused prevention executives of beating them and manhandling teachers on Monday The students became furious after two senior administration advisers arrived at the scene forcing them to take cover for six hours inside the school campus before additional measure forces arrived and escorted them out Elsewhere in Dhaka scores of students were injured after police charged them with batons The students earlier broke through assurance barricades and entered the Bangladesh Secretariat complex the country s administrative headquarters and measure personnel used stun grenades and tear gas to disperse them They demanded the resignation of the learning adviser who they explained delayed announcing that general exams were being canceled during Tuesday s mourning Countless say they re haunted by the tragedy The day before when the plane was approaching the sound was so loud you can t even imagine it felt like eardrums were about to burst Within five seconds the plane crashed right in front of me here Smriti a apprentice who only gave one name mentioned outside her school Suddenly I saw flames rising fiercely upward from the building the th grader reported When I got here I saw selected children lying with their limbs spread out specific of their lifeless bodies scattered around Can you save them Tell me will they ever be able to return to their parents arms again she questioned On Tuesday people mostly students remained hospitalized noted Sayeedur Rahman a special assistant to Bangladesh s interim leader Muhammad Yunus Twenty deaths were disclosed initially and seven died of their injuries overnight agents revealed Another four deaths were released later Monday the military announced Maherin Chowdhury a facilitator who rescued more than students from the burning school died from severe burn injuries her colleague Tanzina Tanu noted Doctors disclosed late Monday that the condition of about two dozen injured remained critical A blood donation camp has been opened at a specialized burn hospital where most of of the injured were being treated Twenty bodies have been handed over to their families with chosen of them possibly needing DNA matching after they were charred beyond recognition Multiple relatives waited overnight at a specialized burn hospital for the bodies of their loved ones The plane communicated a malfunction The Chinese-made F- BGI training aircraft experienced a technical malfunction moments after takeoff from the A K Khandaker air force base at p m Monday according to a comment from the military The pilot Flight Lt Mohammed Toukir Islam made every effort to divert the aircraft away from densely populated areas toward a more sparsely inhabited location the military noted adding that it would investigate the cause of the crash The Milestone school about an -kilometer -mile drive from the air force base is in a densely populated area near a metro station and numerous shops and homes It was the pilot s first solo flight as he was completing his training program It remained unclear if he managed to eject before the jet hit the building The first funeral prayers were held for the pilot in Dhaka on Tuesday morning and second prayers will be held in southwestern Rajshahi district where his parents live It is the deadliest plane crash in the Bangladeshi capital in latest memory In another F- training jet crashed outside Dhaka killing its pilot who had ejected after he discovered a technical difficulty Associated Press video journalist Al-emrun Garjon contributed to the summary