Recovering and Identifying Victims May Take Days : Weather Hampers Search at Leland Crash Site

The first sign of the place where Rep. Mickey Leland’s last humanitarian journey ended is the appearance of American helicopters hovering like dragonflies over the rocky mountaintop.

Then, the crash site itself comes into view: a nearly vertical green cliff, a clearing smudged with black, dotted with shards of metal and the red flags that U.S. search teams placed there Sunday.

Leland, a Texas Democrat, and 15 traveling companions were killed, apparently instantly, when their plane struck the cliff Aug. 7. They had headed out from the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, in heavy weather, to a camp of Sudanese refugees at Fugnido, about 58 miles west of this tiny settlement near the site of the crash.

U.S. service personnel who found the wreckage Sunday have discovered that the rigors of their six-day search may be surpassed by the rigors of the recovery.

“The most difficult problem is the site itself,” said Air Force Maj. Gen. James F. Record, commander of the operation. “The footing out there is treacherous because it is slate and gravel, with heavy undergrowth and high grass. The slope is 60 to 80 degrees over the entire site.”

Because of the terrain, the wreckage cannot be reached except by means of a line suspended from a helicopter. Four U.S. Air Force Blackhawk helicopters with 250-foot-long lines will be used to put people on the site and to retrieve everything from it.

The closest landing place for helicopters appears to be half a mile away--a three-hour overland trip.

Gen. Record said recovery and identification of the bodies could take much of the rest of the week. In perfect weather, he said, the operation could be completed today, but in the usual wind, fog and rain, it could take at least another two days.

Because the condition of the bodies is not yet known, officials are not sure how much time will be needed to identify them, or even if this can be accomplished in Ethiopia. It may be necessary, they said, to wait until they can be taken to a U.S. base in Europe.

In any event, a 40-member American medical team is standing by in Addis Ababa, prepared to begin the identification process.

Also unclear is the extent to which an examination of the wreckage, to be undertaken by an Ethiopian team with American assistance, will disclose what caused the crash.

One mystery is why the plane’s emergency transmitter, a device designed to begin operating automatically upon the impact of a crash, failed to transmit. Record, an experienced search-and-rescue coordinator, said such transmitters work for 72 hours after a crash “in 85% of the cases.”

Some details may never be known, including the weather in the area at the time of the crash. The chief meteorological officer at Addis Ababa airport said Monday that he had advised the plane’s pilot on the day of the crash to cancel his flight because visibility along the flight path was so poor.

Instead, he said, the pilot spotted a cloud clearing from a weather radar photo and tried to make for it.

Helicopters Forced Back

The kind of rough weather that had plagued the search delayed the recovery operation for several hours Monday. Military spokesmen said the MH-60 Blackhawk helicopters that are indispensable to the mission had flown only 50 miles west of Addis Ababa toward the crash site 210 miles away before they ran into heavy fog and low clouds that forced them to return.

Although operations were to have begun at 5 a.m., the helicopters did not leave the capital until 11:15 a.m. They finally reached the site about 1:30 p.m.

Two of the four helicopters did not make it to the crash site at all Monday. They were forced to spend Sunday night and Monday morning at a remote village about 60 miles southwest of Addis Ababa when darkness and fog prevented their return to the capital.

“I can tell you we had a lot of apprehension about setting down there,” said Lt. Col. John Taylor, commander of one of the helicopters. “We were armed men, the town wasn’t expecting us, we were in a strange country and we didn’t know if the natives were friendly.”

As it happened, the crew members were greeted by several hundred friendly villagers who built them a fire, offered them food and engaged them in a nightlong discussion on U.S.-Ethiopian relations. The 12 crew members returned to Addis Ababa on Monday afternoon, glowing with cross-cultural camaraderie.

“I didn’t relish the landing beforehand, but it turned out to be a significant experience in my life,” Taylor said. “I’ll never forget it.”

Strained Relations

In Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the cooperation between the United States and Ethiopia in the search for Leland may ultimately lead to an improvement in relations between the two nations, which have been strained in recent years.

A senior official said later that the search was “an example that there can be good will . . . between us. It is a step forward.” But he added quickly, “It doesn’t negate the issues between us.”

Boucher also said Ethiopia has accepted the offer of help from the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board in investigating the crash.

In Washington, Walter Bollinger, the top administrator for the Agency for International Development’s Africa program, said Leland’s long experience in the area had enabled the agency, a branch of the State Department, to build better relations with Ethiopia.

AID’s mission in Ethiopia, which had shrunk to just one U.S. citizen two years ago, had been increased to five people, three of whom were aboard the Leland plane along with an Ethiopian AID employee.

At the crash site Monday, crews spent the day stringing lines and nets around the wreckage to provide workers with secure footing. Six men were left at the scene overnight to provide security.

Gen. Record said there was no effort Monday to identify the victims at the site. Accordingly, official Pentagon figures still put the number of confirmed dead at 12, out of a total of 16 people on board.

But Record reiterated what has been the conclusion of all those who have viewed the crash site: “In my professional judgment, looking at the site and the impact angle, there were no survivors.”

Times staff writers Norman Kempster and Don Shannon, in Washington, contributed to this story.

CONGRESSMAN KILLED--Rep. Larkin Smith died in a Mississippi plane crash. Page 17