German High School Students, Teachers Among Passengers on Plane That Crashed in France
150 people were on board the flight when it crashed in southern France.
— -- Sixteen students and two teachers from a high school in Germany were among the passengers on the Germanwings flight that crashed in a remote part of southern France today, according to a spokesperson for the city of Haltern, Germany.
The plane was en route from Barcelona, Spain, to Dusseldorf, Germany, when it crashed in the Alps, near the town of Digne, according to the airline.
The students, from Joseph King High School, had been returning from an exchange trip in Barcelona, Haltern spokesperson Florian Adamak said.
This is the "darkest day in the history of our city," Haltern-am-See Mayor Bodo Klimpel said at a news conference.
Klimpel said the school would not close on Wednesday, but "it won't be a routine day of classes."
He said chaplains would be made available and "the students will have the opportunity to talk about the terrible tragedy."
"You can imagine that tomorrow is a particularly difficult day for our teachers, because they have lost two colleagues," Klimpel said.
The plane, an Airbus A320, was carrying 144 passengers -- including 2 babies -- and six crew members, Germanwings CEO Thomas Winkelmann said at a news conference.
There were "apparently no survivors," said French President Hollande.
Germanwings said 67 Germans were on board. There were also Spanish and Turkish passengers, said Spanish King Felipe IV. The State Department is reviewing whether there were any Americans on board.
Opera singers Oleg Bryjak and Maria Radner were also among the passengers, returning from a performance in Barcelona. Radner was on the flight with her husband and baby.
The list of nationalities of the casualties will be released as soon as the airline is certain, Winkelmann said, adding that the victims' families will be informed before a list of names will be released.
The cause of the accident has not yet been determined, the Germanwings CEO said.
Lufthansa is calling the crash "an accident."
"For the time being we are calling this an accident," a Lufthansa official said at a press conference in Barcelona today. "Everything else is speculation."
A black box from the plane was found, the Interior Ministry confirmed, and will be analyzed in the coming hours.
