Greek traveler Antonios Mavropoulos became the only passenger on an Ethiopian airline flight who was not on board at the time of the tragedy. The Greek Reporter published an interview with the traveler, who was only two minutes late for the flight and became the only surviving passenger. According to Mavropoulos , he failed to drop off his luggage on time:
“I saw people getting on the plane and I was very angry about not being let in,” the media outlet quoted the man as saying.
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Antonis Mavropoulos can hardly speak of incredible happiness. The man was only a few minutes late and was not allowed to board an Ethiopian Airlines plane.
He posted a photo of his boarding pass with the departure time on Facebook and shared his story:
“March 10, 2019 is my lucky day. I was only two minutes late, when I arrived the boarding was closed. I saw the last passengers getting on the plane, I begged and screamed to be let through, but I was not allowed.
The airport staff politely offered to put me on the next flight. My vehement protests left no room for discussion and led to the head of the airport police station. He kindly told me not to protest and to thank God because I was the only passenger late for flight ET 302, which had just crashed. I felt the ground pull out from under my feet…”
When the disaster occurred, the tourist was detained by the local police, who summoned him for questioning – it seemed suspicious to the police that Antonios was the only one who had not boarded the dead plane. However, having seen that the Athenian’s luggage was with him, the law enforcers ruled out the possibility of his involvement in the tragedy and spared the tourist from having to give any explanations.
As it turned out, there was a second lucky person who missed the ill-fated flight – Ahmed Khalid. He was going to fly from Dubai to Nairobi with a connection in Ethiopia, but the plane’s departure from Dubai was delayed for unknown reasons.
A Boeing 737 belonging to an Ethiopian airline crashed on the morning of March 10, six minutes after taking off from the airport in the Ethiopian capital. The plane was flying to Nairobi, the capital of Kenya. There were 157 people on board. The cause of the crash has not yet been determined.
