Families of EgyptAir victims to mourn one-year mark

NEWPORT, Rhode Island (Reuters) -- Families and friends of EgyptAir Flight 990 victims will gather Tuesday to pay tribute to loved ones lost last year when the Cairo-bound jet crashed into the Atlantic off the coast of Massachusetts, killing all 217 aboard.

The Boeing 767-300ER aircraft crashed on October 31, 1999, less than an hour after takeoff from New York, shattering into pieces in the ocean about 60 miles south of the exclusive resort island of Nantucket.

For many family members, the rocky point where they will assemble this week will be a familiar scene. On November 7, 1999, eight days after the disaster, mourners braved an icy, whipping wind to kneel, cry and pray at water's edge.

On that clear, cold day, Muslim, Christian and Jewish religious leaders lead an ecumenical service seeking to blunt the grief expressed by the victims' kin.

Tuesday's service will be held at Brenton Point State Park overlooking Narragansett Bay and will be attended by National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chairman Jim Hall, Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Almond and about 500 relatives and friends.

A monument will stand next to the Mariner's Memorial already at the point, which honors those lost at sea off Rhode Island's shores. The monument will read:

"In loving memory of the 217 family members and friends lost on EgyptAir Flight 990 CA, 60 miles south of Nantucket Island, October 31, 1999."

Below that, the marker will be inscribed with the words "May God's eternal light shine upon them", followed by the first line of a poem by English poet Robert Nichols.

"They are not gone from us," it will read in English, French and Arabic.

Placed around the monument will be 217 bricks, each inscribed with a victim's name.

Families to view wreckage

On Wednesday, the NTSB will allow relatives to view the mostly reassembled wreckage of Flight 990.

NTSB spokesman Keith Holloway said the Boeing aircraft is 80 percent rebuilt from recovered wreckage. He said he did not expect the plane to be more extensively reassembled because no more wreckage was being recovered.

In the year since the disaster, victims' family members have established a network to keep each other informed and follow the progress of the investigation.

U.S. officials have suggested that relief co-pilot Gamil al-Batouti deliberately crashed the plane, but the NTSB investigation has not released that finding officially.

Egyptian officials have rejected that line of inquiry and worked on a theory that the plane's elevator panels on the tail, which control whether the nose points up or down, may have jammed.

EgyptAir agreed last Thursday to fly some members of victims' families from Egypt to Newport, Rhode Island.

Earlier, the state-owned airline refused to transport family members to Newport because it was planning its own service in Egypt. That service was postponed when it was learned that the return of victims' remains to Egypt was postponed.

Many of the 89 families, unable to obtain a U.S. visa, were to attend an alternative service in Cairo on Sunday evening, officials said.

"The most compelling reason for them to transport people to Newport is that the only unidentified remains to be interred are going to be interred in Newport," said Jim Brokaw, of Ogden Dunes, Indiana, who lost his father and stepmother in the catastrophe.

"Many families have not had victims' remains returned and this will allow them to have a burial," he said.

Rhode Island officials are still working to compile DNA profiles for all 217 victims and have not released the thumbnail-sized remains.

The memorial service will be followed by a multi-faith burial ceremony in a nearby cemetery. Unidentified remains unsuitable for DNA testing will be interred.

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

See related sites about US

Note: Pages will open in a new browser window

External sites are not endorsed by CNN Interactive.