Foreign News
Passengers recall horror onboard flight SQ 321
More than 140 travellers and crew members who were onboard a flight hit by severe turbulence landed in Singapore on a relief flight earlier this morning.
Passengers onboard SQ321 which was heading from London to Singapore, recounted scenes of “absolute terror”, with one passenger saying he saw a woman with an “awful gash on her head”, and heard another “screaming in agony”.
A 73-year-old British man, Geoff Kitchen, died from a suspected heart attack onboard, while several others remain seriously injured.
Mr Kitchen is believed to have suffered a heart attack when the plane was hit by the turbulence. Reports say he was on his way to Singapore to start a six-week holiday along with his wife who was also on board.
The Singapore-bound Boeing 777-300ER diverted to Bangkok following the mid-air incident, making an emergency landing at 15:45 local time (08:45 GMT) with some 211 passengers and 18 crew aboard.
Smitivej Hospital, in Bangkok, said 104 people were treated and 58 remain in hospital, 20 of whom are in the intensive care unit. There are 15 Britons still being treated in hospital, with six in intensive care, the hospital said.
Andrew Davies, a British passenger onboard the Boeing 777-300ER, told the BBC’s Radio that the plane “suddenly dropped with very little warning”. “The thing I remember the most is seeing objects and things flying through the air. I was covered in coffee. It was incredibly severe turbulence,” he said.
Another passenger said those not wearing seatbelts were “launched immediately into the ceiling”. “Very suddenly there was a very dramatic drop, so everyone seated and not wearing a seatbelt was launched immediately into the ceiling,” 28-year-old student Dzafran Azmir told Reuters. “I saw people from across the aisle just going completely horizontal, hitting the ceiling and landing back down in really awkward positions. People getting massive gashes in the head concussions.” Azmir added that people’s heads had slammed into the overhead panels above the seats and “pushed through” some of the panels.
Another Briton, Jerry, 68, was travelling to Australia for his son’s wedding. He said there was no warning before the “plane plunged”. “I hit my head on the ceiling, my wife did – some poor people who were walking around ended up doing somersaults,” he recalled. “My son was thrown down on the floor two rows behind me. I heard that there was a guy hitting the roof in the toilet and he was injured quite badly, too,” he said, speaking from a Thai hospital. He added that he and his family were “lucky enough” that none of them had died.
The family had been travelling to Australia for his son’s wedding on Friday, but now would not be able to make it, he said.
One Singaporean man, whose son was onboard the plane, said he was “thrown all over the place”. Chiew says his 22-year-old son was in London on holiday visiting his girlfriend, who was studying there on an exchange programme. The pair were flying back to Singapore when turbulence hit. He told the BBC: “My son was on his way to the restroom, while his girlfriend was seated. Both are okay. He said his son had messaged him yesterday afternoon to say he had landed in Bangkok after the flight was diverted.
An airline official said that about 10 hours into its flight, the plane had encountered “sudden extreme turbulence” over Myanmar’s Irrawaddy Basin at 37,000 feet.
Singapore Airlines also provided details on the nationalities of those on the flight, which included 56 people from Australia and 47 from the UK.
Allison Barker said she received a message from her son, Josh, who was on the plane en route to Bali: “I don’t want to scare you, but I’m on a crazy flight. The plane is making an emergency landing… I love you all.”
After that message, she waited for a “petrifying” two hours before hearing from him again. “One minute, he was just sitting down wearing a seatbelt, the next minute, he must have blacked out because he found himself on the floor with other people,” she told the BBC. Josh, she said, sustained minor injuries – but she is concerned that coming close to death could have a lasting impact on him.
The head of Singapore Airlines, Goh Choon Phong, apologised on Wednesday morning, saying the carrier was “very sorry for the traumatic experience”.
In a video statement, Mr Goh said the airline was “fully cooperating with relevant authorities on the investigations”. He also expressed his condolences to the family of the victim, adding that they would “render all possible assistance” to affected passengers and crew members.
Singapore Prime Minister Lawrence Wong also sent his “deepest condolences” to the family and loved ones of the deceased, adding that Singapore was “working closely with Thai authorities”.
He also said Singapore’s Transport Safety Investigation Bureau would conduct a thorough investigation into the incident.
Accidents involving Singapore Airlines are rare, with the carrier consistently ranking among the world’s safest.
The last fatal accident occurred in 2000, when a Boeing 747 crashed while attempting to take off from the wrong runway at a Taiwan airport.
Some 83 people of the 179 people onboard were killed.
Turbulence is most commonly caused by aircraft flying through cloud, but there is also “clear air” turbulence which is not visible on a jet’s weather radar.
“Injuries from severe turbulence are relatively rare in the context of millions of flights operated,” aviation expert John Strickland told the BBC.
Aviation journalist Sally Gethin said wearing a seatbelt could be the “difference between life and death”, explaining that anything not bolted down is at risk during severe turbulence.
Research has shown that climate change will make severe turbulence more likely in the future.
(BBC)
China has executed four members of the Bai family mafia, one of the notorious dynasties that ran scam centres in Myanmar, state media report.
They were among 21 of the family’s members and associates who were convicted of fraud, homicide, injury and other crimes by a court in Guangdong province.
Last November the court sentenced five of them to death including the clan’s patriarch Bai Suocheng, who died of illness after his conviction, state media reported.
Last week, China executed 11 members of the Ming family mafia as part of its crackdown on scam operations in South East Asia that have entrapped thousands of Chinese victims.
For years, the Bais, Mings and several other families dominated Myanmar’s border town of Laukkaing, where they ran casinos, red-light districts and cyberscam operations.
Among the clans, the Bais were “number one”, Bai Suocheng’s son previously told state media after he was detained.
The Bais, who controlled their own militia, established 41 compounds to house cyberscam activities and casinos, authorities said. Within the walls of those compounds was a culture of violence, where beatings and torture were routine.
The Bai family’s criminal activities led to the deaths of six Chinese citizens, the suicide of one person and multiple injuries, the court said.
The Bais rose to power in Laukkaing in the early 2000s after the town’s then warlord was ousted in a military operation led by Min Aung Hlaing – who now leads Myanmar’s military government.
The military leader had been looking for co-operative allies, and Bai Suocheng – then a deputy of the warlord – fitted the bill.
But the families’ empires crashed in 2023, when Beijing became frustrated by the Myanmar military’s inaction on the scam operations and tacitly backed an offensive by ethnic insurgents in the area, which marked a turning point in Myanmar’s civil war.
That led to the capture of the scam mafias and their members were handed to Beijing.
In China, they became subjects of state documentaries which emphasised Chinese authorities’ resolve to eradicate the scam networks.
With these recent executions Beijing appears to be sending a message of deterrence to would-be scammers.
Hundreds of thousands of people have been trafficked to run online scams in Myanmar and elsewhere in South East Asia, according to estimates by the United Nations.
Among them are thousands of Chinese people, and their victims who they swindle billions of dollars from are mainly Chinese as well.
(BBC)
The US federal government has partially shutdown despite a last-ditch funding deal approved by the Senate.
The funding lapse began at midnight US eastern time (05:00 GMT) on Saturday, hours after senators agreed to fund most agencies until September. The bill includes just two weeks’ funding for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees immigration enforcement, instead of shutting it down entirely.
The bill has yet to be approved by the House of Representatives, which is out of session.
US President Donald Trump struck the deal with Democrats after they refused to give more funding for immigration enforcement following the fatal shooting of two US citizens in Minneapolis by federal agents.
It is the second such government shutdown in the past year and comes just 11 weeks after the end of the previous funding impasse that lasted 43 days, the longest in US history.
That shutdown in 2025, which spanned 1 October to 14 November, had widespread impacts on essential government services including air travel and left hundreds of thousands of federal workers without pay for weeks.
This shutdown, however, is unlikely to be that long or widespread as the House of Representatives is set to be back in session on Monday.
The White House, though, has directed several agencies, including the departments of transportation, education and defence to execute shutdown plans.
“Employees should report to work for their next regularly scheduled tour of duty to undertake orderly shutdown activities,” a White House memo to agencies said. “It is our hope that this lapse will be short.”
Trump has urged Republicans, who hold the majority of seats in the US House, to vote for the deal.
Lawmakers plan to use the fortnight in which the DHS will continue to be funded to negotiate a deal. Democrats want that deal to include new policies for immigration enforcement agents.
“We need to rein in ICE and end the violence,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said referring to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“That means ending roving patrols. It means requiring rules, oversight, and judicial warrants… Masks need to come off, cameras need to stay on, and officers need visible identification. No secret police.”
Both Republican and Democratic lawmakers have sharply criticised tactics used by immigration agents in the wake of the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis last weekend.
Pretti, an intensive care nurse, was shot by a US Border Patrol agent after an altercation in which several agents tried to restrain him.
On Friday, the Justice Department launched a civil rights investigation into the shooting.
[BBC]
Sustained heavy gunfire and loud explosions have been heard in Niger near the international airport outside the capital, Niamey.
Multiple eyewitness accounts and videos showed air defence systems apparently engaging unidentified projectiles in the early hours of Thursday.
The situation later calmed down, reports say, with an official reportedly saying the situation was now under control, without elaborating.
It is not clear what caused the blasts, or if there were any casualties. There has been no official statement from the military government.
The gunfire and blasts began shortly after midnight, according to residents of a neighbourhood near the Diori Hamani International Airport, the AFP news agency reports. They said calm returned after two hours.
The airport houses an air force base and is located about 10km (six miles) from the presidential palace.
Niger is led by Abdourahamane Tiani who seized power in a 2023 coup that ousted the country’s elected civilian president.
Like its neighbours Burkina Faso and Mali, the country has been fighting jihadist groups who have carried out deadly attacks across the region.
It is also a major producer of uranium.
A huge uranium shipment destined for export has been stuck at the airport amid unresolved legal and diplomatic complications with France after the military government nationalised the country’s uranium mines.
“The situation is under control. There is no need to worry,” the Anadolu news agency quoted a Foreign Affairs ministry official as saying, without elaborating.
The official told the agency they were trying to determine whether the gunfire was linked to the uranium shipment.
[BBC]
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