154 Killed in Michigan Airplane Crash

ROMULUS, Mich.--Walking among charred bodies covered with bright yellow sheets, teams of federal investigators yesterday began looking for clues in the wreckage of a jetliner that slammed into the ground and exploded, killing at least 154 people.

Witnesses said the Northwest Airlines plane rocked from side to side and plunged to the ground moments after takeoff Sunday night, trailing fire as it skidded beneath an Interstate 94 overpass and broke into dozens of burning pieces on the interstate and Middlebelt Road, which borders Detroit Metropolitan Airport. It was the nation's second-worst air disaster.

State police closed Interstate 94, and the Michigan Department of Transportation said it would stay closed for at least two to three days.

"Once you move evidence, in certain situations, you're destroying facts we need to know. Things, such as where they find bodies, where they find parts of the airplane, are crucial," said Alan Pollock, a spokesman for the National Transportation Safety Board.

"It is time-consuming. It's difficult. These type of accidents put a strain on investigators and facilities, but most of all on the families of the victims. That's the tragedy."

A four-year-old girl was hospitalized in critical condition, and officials tried to determine whether she had been in the plane or on the ground.

Pollock said the black box and cockpit voice recorder from the McDonnell Douglas MD-80, an updated version of the DC-9, had been recovered and were sent to Washington for analysis in NTSB laboratories. It would be 60 days before a transcript is released, he said.

Some debris had been taken from the site, and seven people were arrested for allegedly looting Sunday night, officials said. Wayne County Sheriff Robert Ficano said the people were carrying items ranging from purses to pieces of the plane but his office refused to give out any more information.

By yesterday afternoon, workers were recovering bodies and beginning to map the location of each large piece of the wreckage of Flight 255, said John Lauber, an NTSB board member.

The agency had formed 11 technical teams of nearly 100 people and more experts probably would be added later, he said.

An FBI forensics team was working to help identify bodies. The agency was called to the scene Sunday night after reports of an explosion before the crash.

However, Joseph Jackson, the assistant agent in charge of the FBI's Michigan's operations, described the agency's presence as routine and said "there's absolutely no indication of anything other than an accident."

Flight 255, which had originated in Saginaw, was en route to Phoenix, Ariz., and suburban Los Angeles when it crashed in clear weather at 8:46 p.m. Investigators were checking reports it was on fire before it plunged, and the FBI was sent to scene because of reports there might have been an explosion before the crash.

The crash killed two people on the ground and at least 152 of the 153 people on board. The four-year-old girl was found alive in the wreckage under the body of a woman.

"Her survival was due to being padded by her mother, at least we assume it was her mother," said Pam Davidson, a paramedic who was present when the child was found. "There was debris everywhere and there was no way to determine if the wreckage was part of the plane or another vehicle."

The girl, who suffered burns over a fourth of her body, was in critical condition at the intensive care unit of C.S. Mott Children's Hospital in Ann Arbor.

At least six people, all of whom had been on the ground, were treated at hospitals for injuries caused by the crash. One man, Lawrence Favio, 30, of Lincoln Park, was airlifted to the University of Michigan Medical Center and was in critical condition with burns over 39 percent of his body, said a hospital spokeswoman.

The death toll from the crash made it the nation's second worst. The crash of an American Airlines DC-10 on May 25, 1979, at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport is the nation's worst air disaster. It killed 275 people.