Twenty-one years have passed this year since the unspeakable tragedy that indelibly marked Cyprus, in the summer of 2005, when on August 14 a flight that started like all the others turned into a tragedy.
The crash of the Helios Airways aircraft, which was operating a flight from Larnaca airport to Prague and a stopover at "Eleftherios Venizelos" airport, shocked the whole of Cyprus.
The aircraft crashed in the mountainous area of Grammatiko, Attica, killing 121 people, including 22 children, including 6 crew members. 103 were of Cypriot origin and 12 were Greek.
Entire families were wiped out, while many children lost their parents and were left orphans.
On Sunday, August 9, the annual memorial service of the head of the Metropolitan of Constantia and Famagusta Vassilios was held at the Metropolitan Church of Agios Georgios in Paralimni, where many of the 121 victims of the tragedy came from.
The Minister of Transport, Communications and Works, Evanthia Tsolaki, in her memorial speech, said that the presence of the State is not formal but is a debt to the families of the victims. Their pain, he underlined, is not private or forgotten, but is part of the collective memory of Cyprus.
He particularly focused on the strength, dignity and endurance of the families of the victims, who, 21 years after the tragedy, are still carrying the burden of loss.
The Minister laid a wreath on behalf of the President of the Republic, Nikos Christodoulides. After the memorial service, a memorial service and laying of wreaths took place at the Municipal Cemetery of Paralimni, in memory of the victims of the tragedy.
The flight
The fatal aircraft departed on the morning of August 14, 2005 from Larnaca airport with a final destination in Prague and a stopover in "Eleftherios Venizelos" in Athens. At 10.15 in the morning, the aircraft entered the National Airspace of Athens, but without having any contact with the Control Tower.
At 11:05, two F-16 fighters took off from Nea Anchialos, which came into visual contact with the plane at 11:18 and found that the co-pilot of the aircraft was unconscious, the captain was not in his position and the oxygen supply system with masks had been activated.
As it turned out from the investigations, the aircraft was flying on autopilot and with all passengers having lost consciousness except for the flight attendant Andreas Prodromou who was trying to take control of it. At 12.05 the aircraft crashed in the mountainous area of Grammatiko, killing 115 passengers and a six-member crew.
Court decision
On February 18, 2013, the Nicosia Criminal Court acquitted all the defendants in the case of the crash, on August 14, 2005, in Attica, of the fatal plane "Boeing 737-300" in Grammatiko, Attica, an accident that resulted in the death of 121 people.
The acquittal was made after the suspension of the criminal prosecution registered by the Attorney General's Office for all the accused natural persons and the airline "Helios".
The defendants were the Executive Chairman of "Helios" Andreas Drakos and the CEO of the same company Dimitris Pantazis, as well as the Flight Director Giorgos Kikkidis and the Bulgarian chief pilot of the company Yanko Stoimenov.
The Athens Court of Appeal had upheld the conviction imposed at first instance by the Three-Member Misdemeanor Court, in its decision of 7 February 2013. Their sentence, 122 years in prison for each, was commuted to a ten-year sentence and then to a fine. After paying about €73,000, they were released.
Based on the principle that no one is tried by two countries for the same offense, the three were expected to be removed from the Cypriot indictment. The Attorney General ruled that the prosecution for all the defendants should be suspended, citing insurmountable difficulties in advancing the case.
