The Somalia-based al-Qaida affiliate Al Shabaab has been fingered by U.S. investigators as the likely culprit of a plane blast that sucked out a passenger and sent him hurtling to his death during a flight over eastern Africa.
Al Shabaab is a radical Muslim outfit that's been waging war against the Western-backed Somalia government for some time. The group hasn't claimed responsibility for the horrific explosion that sent a reportedly badly burned body to the ground over Somalia, as WND reported.
But U.S. investigators, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they'd detected traces of possible TNT explosive on the craft and that it was believed Al Shabaab set off a bomb, the Daily Mail reported.
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The Daallo Airlines Flight D3159 was forced to make an emergency landing just five minutes after taking off, due to the blast. One witness, Hassan Mohamed Nur, said the cabin went black and smoke filled the air, and then a man was sucked through the gaping hole in the plane's fuselage.
"I saw the passenger, a man in his early 60s, get sucked out of the plane," he said to the Daily Mail. "There was a huge bang. A big hole appeared in the side of the jet and the man disappeared through it. One minute he was in his seat, the next he was gone. He'd been sucked out of the plane. People were screaming. We all thought we were going to die."
Ground investigators later discovered the body of a badly charred man in Balad, 18 miles from Mogadishu, where the plane made an emergency landing.
Airline officials also said two others were hurt in the explosion.
Despite the fact U.S. investigators say the explosion was caused by a bomb, Somalia officials said they've not found evidence of any purposeful attack.
The witness, Nur, meanwhile, pointed to weather.
"I blame the cause [on] the bad weather," he said, the Daily Mail reported. "Imagine if the cause was a bomb. Could the plane make a safe landing within 15 minutes of take off?"