Sixteen students and two teachers from Haltern, Germany, were aboard the Germanwings plane that crashed Tuesday in France, the airline’s CEO Thomas Winkelmann said.
They were among 150 people — 144 passengers and six crew members — on the Airbus A320 that crashed in the French Alps, officials said. Leaders in France and Spain have said they don’t believe there are any survivors.
“The whole city is shocked and we can feel it everywhere,” Haltern Mayor Bodo Klimpel said at a news conference. “This is the worst, what happened… what you can imagine.”
He said they were exchange students who studied in Spain and were on the flight because they were coming home. The plane left Barcelona and was bound for Dusseldorf, Germany.
Haltern is about 50 miles from Dusseldorf.
Spain’s El Pais newspaper is reporting the German students were returning to their home country after spending a week at the Giola Institute, in the town of Llinars del Valles, near Barcelona.
Some of the relatives of the Haltern victims heard about the crash on the news. Some parents went to the airport while others rushed to the school, Joseph Koenig Gymnasium, he said.
Weeping relatives arrived throughout the day at Barcelona’s airport. Terminal 2 was blocked off for them, Spain’s air transportation agency said. Medics and psychologists are there in the private space to assist families, CNN’s Karl Penhaul reported from the airport.
Spain’s King Felipe VI said earlier Tuesday that a “high numbers of Spaniards, Germans and Turks” were on the aircraft.
Winkelmann said that there were at least 67 Germans on board, but cautioned that figure could change as new information comes to light.
The Dutch foreign ministry says there was at least one Dutch national on board, and Belgium’s foreign ministry said one Belgian national was on the plane.
German President Joachim Gauck said he is ending his trip in South America to return to Berlin.
In Lima, Peru, Tuesday, Gauck conveyed condolences to loved ones of the victims. “I hope they find consolation in this difficult time,” he said.
