Flight 302 passengers included 32 Kenyans, nine Britons and 22 people affiliated with the UN

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Passengers of more than 35 nationalities were among the 157 people killed after an Ethiopian Airlines flight from Addis Ababa to Nairobi crashed six minutes after takeoff on Sunday morning.

The Boeing 737 Max 8 plane was believed to be carrying 149 passengers and eight crew members. The passengers included 32 Kenyan citizens, 18 people from Canada, nine from Ethiopia, nine from the UK, eight from each of Italy, China and the US, and seven from France.

UN assembly attendees

Many of the passengers were en route to the UN environment assembly in the Kenyan capital.

Officials said at least 22 people affiliated with the organisation were killed in the crash, with some of the names yet to be disclosed.

At the opening of the UN assembly, delegates paid their respects with a moment of silence.

Siim Kiisler, the Estonian environment minister, said: “We have lost fellow delegates, interpreters and UN staff. I express my condolences to those who lost loved ones in the crash.”

Inger Andersen, the incoming UN environment chief, said the organisation was “devastated”.

She added: “This is a house in mourning, but a house that doesn’t yet know all the facts.”

The African Diaspora Youth Forum in Europe said its co-chairman, Karim Saafi, was on the flight and was due to represent it at a meeting with the African Union in Nairobi.

Save the Children said its child protection in emergencies adviser, Tamirat Mulu Demessie, was among the dead.

A spokesman for the UN secretary general, António Guterres, said he was “deeply saddened at the tragic loss of lives”.

He added: “He conveys his heartfelt sympathies and solidarity to the victims’ families and loved ones, including those of United Nations staff members, as well as sincere condolences to the government and people of Ethiopia.”

UK

At least nine British nationals were on the flight, the Foreign Office said. On Tuesday, Sam Pegram, 25, an aid worker from Lancashire who was travelling to Nairobi to deliver a training programme, was named as one of them.

He was an intern with the Norwegian Refugee Council, based in Geneva, and had previously helped refugees in Jordan.

Pegram’s mother, Deborah, told the Lancashire Evening Post: “Sam was so looking forward to going to Nairobi. He loved the work he was doing. We can’t believe this has happened. We’re totally devastated.”

Sahra Hassan Said and her son Nasrudin Abdulkadir, both dual Somali-British nationals, were also confirmed among the dead.

The first British victim to be named was Joanna Toole, a 36-year-old environmental campaigner from Exmouth, Devon, who worked for the fisheries and aquaculture department of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).

The department’s director, Manuel Barange, tweeted he was “profoundly sad and lost for words”. He said she had been travelling to Nairobi to represent the FAO at the UN environment assembly.

Barange said Toole, who lived in Rome, where the FAO is based, was “a wonderful human being who loved her work with a passion. Our love to her family and loved ones.”

Her father, Adrian Toole, told Devon Live: “Joanna’s work was not a job, it was her vocation. She had never really wanted to do anything else but work in animal welfare since she was a child.

“Everybody was very proud of her and the work she did; we’re still in a state of shock.”

Sarah Auffret, 30, another victim, was believed to be a French-British dual citizen. The Plymouth University graduate was an environmental agent for the Norway-based Association of Arctic Expedition Cruise Operators and had been travelling to the same UN event.

The family of Joseph Waithaka, 55, a Kenyan and British dual national, said he had died in the crash.

His son Ben Kuria told the BBC his father, who lived in Hull for more than a decade before moving back to Kenya, was a generous man who “loved justice”.

Waithaka, who had worked for Humberside probation trust, saw his son on Saturday in Croydon, south London, before heading off to Kenya via Addis Ababa.

“I gave him a hug and shook his hand, because in my culture it’s more about the handshake than it is about the hug,” Kuria told BBC News. “I said we’ll probably see you at some point soon. We usually spend a bit more time saying goodbye, but yesterday it kind of just felt routine.”

Nigeria

Abiodun Oluremi Bashua, a Nigerian ambassador, was also killed in the crash. The Nigerian foreign ministry said it received the news of his death “with great shock”.

After joining the Nigerian foreign service in 1976, Bashua served at embassies in cities around the world, including Vienna, Abidjan and Tehran.

He also served as secretary to the conference of the parties to the UN framework convention on climate change. At the time of his death, Bashua was on contract with the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa.

Pius Adesanmi, a Nigerian professor at Carleton University in Ottawa, also died on the flight.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Pius Adesanmi won the inaugural Penguin prize for African non-fiction writing in 2010. Photograph: Josh Hotz/AP

Adesanmi, the author of Naija No Dey Carry Last, a collection of satirical essays, was described as a “towering figure in African and postcolonial scholarship” by Benoit-Antoine Bacon, Carleton’s president and vice-chancellor.

Ireland

One Irish national, Michael Ryan, was killed. Ryan worked for the UN World Food Programme (WFP) as a global deputy chief engineer, and had been on a work trip in Ethiopia.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Michael Ryan. Photograph: World Food Programme/PA

Germany

The German national Anne-Katrin Feigl was named as a victim of the crash by the International Organisation for Migration.

She was on her way to a training course in Nairobi as part of her role as a junior professional officer at the organisation.

Rev Norman Tendis, 51, was also among the victims. The pastor was based in Austria and was travelling to the UN environment summit.

Italy

Three members of the humanitarian organisation Africa Tremila, based in Bergamo, were onboard.

The aid group’s president, Carlo Spini, his wife, Gabriella Viggiani, and its treasurer, Matteo Ravasio, were among eight Italians killed.

Virginia Chimenti and Maria Pilar Buzzetti, who worked for the WFP, also died.

Sebastiano Tusa, 66, an underwater archaeologist, was killed, the Italian government said. He had been flying to Kenya to work on a project with Unesco.

Kenya

Senior Capt Yared Mulugeta Gatechew, who was of Kenyan and Ethiopian heritage, was the main pilot onflight 302 and had been working for the airline since November 2007.

Other victims from Kenya included Hussein Swaleh, a former secretary general of the Football Kenya Federation, who was due to return home on the flight after working as the match commissioner in an African Champions League game in Egypt on Friday.

Another Kenyan on the flight was Cedric Asiavugwa, a law student at Georgetown University in Washington DC. Asiavugwa, who was born and raised in Mombasa, was on his way to Nairobi after the death of his fiancee’s mother. Before he came to Georgetown, he worked with groups helping refugees in Zimbabwe, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, the university said.

Anthony Ngare, a former journalist who was working for the UN’s cultural agency Unesco as a deputy director of communications, also died.

The 49-year-old had recently represented Kenya at a UN conference in Paris and was on his way to Nairobi.

Ethiopia

Sara Gebre Michael, the lead cabin attendant, was a caring mother who would be sorely missed, said neighbour Tesfaye Mamo, an artist.

Michael is survived by her husband and three children.

Togo

Kodjo Glato was a professor at the University of Lomé.

Ryan Brown, the Johannesburg bureau chief for the news organisation Christian Science Monitor, tweeted that Glato had “a passion for sweet potatoes and how they could be used to improve food security in west Africa”.

Austria

The Austrian foreign ministry spokesman, Peter Guschelbauer, said three doctors in their early 30s were onboard. The men were on their way to Zanzibar, he said, but he could not confirm the purpose of their trip.

Slovakia

Anton Hrnko, a Slovakian politician, said his wife, Blanka, daughter, Michala, and son, Martin, were killed in the crash. Hrnko, The Slovak National party MP said he was “in deep grief” over their deaths.

Sweden

Three Swedish nationals are believed to have been on the plane. Tamarind Group, a hospitality company, announced “with immense shock and grief” that its chief executive, Jonathan Seex, was among the victims.

Norway

Karoline Aadland, 28, was a programme finance coordinator for the Norwegian Red Cross.

The Norwegian Red Cross tweeted: “Our thoughts are with her next of kin. Our focus is on providing them with assistance in this difficult time.”

Russia

Yekaterina Polyakova, her husband, Alexander Polyakov, and Sergei Vyalikov, all tourists, were among the Russians on the flight, said the Russian embassy in Ethiopia.

US

The Baltimore-based Catholic Relief Services announced that four of its colleagues died in the crash.

The aid group said Sara Chalachew, Getnet Alemayehu, Sintayehu Aymeku and Mulusew Alemu had been travelling to Nairobi for training.

Canada

Six members of one Canadian family were among those killed. The Dixit-Vaidya family were travelling on a family holiday to Kenya, where Kosha Vaidya, 37, was born. She was travelling with her husband, Prerit Dixit, 45, two daughters, Ashka, 14 and Anushka, 13, and parents Pannagesh Vaidya, 71, and Hansini Vaidya, 63. They lived in Brampton, outside Toronto. The mayor of Brampton has described their loss as “unbelievably tragic”.

Danielle Moore, 24, was travelling to the UN environment conference. She was working as a member of the clean ocean advocacy group Ocean Wise and as an education lead for the charity Canada Learning Code.