Families stunned by crash

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If you need help getting information about the crash of Caspian Airlines Flight 7908, call the Armenian Council of America on (818) 502-6580.

GLENDALE — Local families Wednesday were left grappling with the news that loved ones were among the 168 people killed earlier in the day on an Armenia-bound airplane that crashed in Iran.

The flight was bound for the Armenian capital, Yerevan, but crashed into an Iranian field about 20 minutes after leaving Tehran. All 153 passengers and 15 crew members on Caspian Airlines Flight 7908 were killed in the fiery noontime crash, which left a gapping hole in the farm field amid scattered pieces of the Russian-made jet.

The disaster was described by news reports as the worst airplane crash in Iran in six years.

Burbank resident Talin Davidian’s father, Levon Davidian, was one of the passengers killed in the crash. Levon Davidian was a well-known Iranian Armenian psychologist.

“We’re shocked, and we don’t believe it,” she said.

A self-described “control freak” when it came to her father’s travels, Talin Davidian said she always talked her father by phone before and after a flight.

But the phone never rang.

Her father had planned to fly out today, but took an earlier flight to surprise her mother in Armenia, she said.

Talin Davidian called her brother in Iran about 4:30 a.m. when she couldn’t get through to her father’s cell phone. He confirmed that her father had been killed in the crash.

“It’s unbelievable,” she said.

She has flown Caspian Airlines in the past from Iran to Armenia and never had any difficulties, “but they obviously had problems.”

“They were not Lufthansa, but they were OK,” she said, referring to the higher-priced German airline.

Hamaspour Polady, whose family lives in Glendale, was also confirmed as a passenger of Flight 7908 by a family friend who answered the phone at her family’s residence Wednesday.

Family members of Polady — whose name was spelled differently according to several passenger lists that were released and translated from Persian — were in shock and trying to get more details about the crash, said the friend, who did not want to be identified.

An Armenian Relief Society employee had a cousin on the flight who was going to meet his wife on vacation in Armenia, an agency representative said.

Since the nonprofit opened its doors Wednesday morning, concerned family members who wanted more details about the crash had been dropping in.

The Armenian Relief Society was one of several groups Wednesday that obtained a list of Armenian passengers, translated from Persian, who reportedly died in the crash, although the thoroughness of the lists could not be confirmed.

At least two other passengers had family members who live in Glendale, said Vasken Khodanian, chairman of Armenian Council of America.

“We are trying to contact them,” he said.

Local churches will be holding services Sunday to remember those who died in the crash, Khodanian said.

“Basically they rely on the church, in this case, to give them comfort,” he said.

— Jason Wells contributed to this report.