Morning Update: The Ethiopian Airlines disaster, from the victims to the Boeing plane

Good morning,

This is what we know so far about the Ethiopian Airlines disaster

A Carleton professor. An Edmonton mother and daughter. A Calgary accountant. Eighteen Canadians were among 157 people killed when an Ethiopian Airlines plane crashed minutes after takeoff yesterday. Here are the key details:

• The Ethiopian Airlines disaster is the second crash in less than five months involving the new Boeing 737 Max 8 plane. 189 people died in October when a Lion Air flight crashed in Indonesia just 13 minutes after takeoff.
• Dozens of humanitarian workers from the United Nations and other relief agencies were among the dead. The crash happened the day before the start of the UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi.
• The passengers included 32 Kenyans, 18 Canadians, nine Ethiopians, eight Americans, plus others from a total of 35 countries.
• Flight-tracking data showed that the plane’s “vertical speed was unstable” after it took off from the Addis Ababa airport in Ethiopia. The captain had more than 8,000 hours of flying experience and an excellent record, Ethiopian Airlines said.
• Ethiopian Airlines said Monday that both the cockpit voice recorder and the digital flight data recorder have been recovered.

This is a developing story. Go here for the latest updates.

These are the Canadian victims identified so far

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Pius Adesanmi: The Carleton University English professor and director of the school’s Institute of African Studies was remembered as a “towering figure in African and postcolonial scholarship.”

Amina Ibrahim Odowa and daughter Sofia: Odowa, who immigrated to Canada with her family in 2006, was travelling to Nairobi with her five-year-old to visit relatives.

Danielle Moore: The 24-year-old from Scarborough had posted on Facebook Saturday that she was “so excited” and “beyond privileged” to announce she had been selected to attend the UN Environment Assembly.

Derick Lwugi: “If people had any needs or problems, he was there,” said his wife Gladys. Lwugi, an accountant with the City of Calgary, also leaves behind three children.

Peter DeMarsh: The president of the International Family Forestry Alliance, who was from Taymouth, N.B., was headed to Nairobi to attend a conference on forests and climate change.

More on the Boeing 737 Max 8

Air Canada currently has 24 Max 8s in its fleet, while WestJet flies 13 and Sunwing has four. Air Canada said it has operated the aircraft type since 2017 without any major issues, and WestJet also said it “remains confident in the safety” of its Boeing fleet.

China’s aviation regulator has ordered its domestic airlines to suspend their use of the Max aircraft. Ethiopia and Indonesia have done the same.

Investigators probing the Lion Air crash found there were technical problems recorded in the plane’s maintenance log in the days before the October incident, including errors in airspeed and altitude displays. The plane’s automatic anti-stalling feature repeatedly pushed down the plane’s nose.

After the Lion Air crash in Indonesia, Boeing issued a safety bulletin to pilots telling them how to respond to the risk of erroneous data.

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MORE TOP STORIES

The severity of the SNC-Lavalin allegations is likely why a settlement was denied, a minister says

But Procurement Minister Carla Qualtrough said there remains a case for a deferred prosecution agreement with SNC: “I mean, these trials can absolutely fall apart,” she told CTV’s Question Period. “Corporate crime is hard to prove. A DPA would grant, in some way, a guaranteed punishment for a company that might get off criminally.” (for subscribers)

Over the weekend, The Globe spoke with four former attorneys-general who said Justin Trudeau and senior officials attempted to use a well-known legal principle as justification for political interference. The principle cited by Trudeau, Gerald Butts and Michael Wernick is that prosecutors, like then-attorney-general Jody Wilson-Raybould, need to keep an open mind until the very end of a prosecution.

And separately, Liberal MP Celina Caesar-Chavannes told The Globe she was met with “hostility” and “anger” when she told Trudeau she was leaving politics.

Venezuela’s humanitarian crisis: The country is entering its fifth day of a nationwide blackout

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Lines to buy water and fuel are growing while already-scarce food supplies are at risk of rotting in shops and homes. President Nicolas Maduro has called the outage an act of U.S.-backed sabotage, while critics say it’s the result of incompetence and corruption. School and business activities have been temporarily suspended, and only 100 of Venezuela’s 1,800 gas stations were in operation.

The blackout comes as previously unpublished footage contradicts the U.S. assertion that pro-Maduro forces torched a humanitarian aid convoy last month. A Molotov cocktail thrown by an anti-government protester was most likely the cause of the blaze, according to the New York Times.

Ontario’s police watchdog is warning proposed reforms open the door to ‘political interference’

Premier Doug Ford’s Bill 68 “would completely subvert the SIU’s independence and its police oversight mission,” Special Investigations Unit director Tony Loparco said.

Right now, the SIU investigates any serious cases involving interaction with police, including deaths, injuries and allegations of sexual assault. The new bill would restrict the agency to investigating officers only when an incident “may have resulted from criminal conduct by an official.”

Loparco said this change could lead to accusations of “anti-police bias” while also leaving it in the hands of police chiefs to decide whether one of their officers likely committed a crime.

One of Australia’s largest miners is buying a majority stake in a B.C. mine

Newcrest’s US$806-million deal for a 70-per-cent stake in an Imperial Metals property comes amid a slew of deals in the gold sector. Canada’s Barrick – the world’s largest gold company – recently tabled a hostile takeover offer for No. 2 firm Newmont. And Newcrest was playing a behind-the-scenes role in that effort. (for subscribers)

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MORNING MARKETS

Stocks rise

Talk of more stimulus from China helped world share markets regain some ground on Monday after a slew of concerning economic data and growth warnings from central banks triggered their worst weekly performance so far this year. Tokyo’s Nikkei gained 0.5 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng 1 per cent, and the Shanghai Composite 1.9 per cent. In Europe, London’s FTSE 100, Germany’s DAX and the Paris CAC 40 were up by between 0.2 and 1 per cent by about 6 a.m. ET. New York futures were mixed. The Canadian dollar was at about 74.5 US cents.

WHAT EVERYONE’S TALKING ABOUT

Winter: a pain for some of us, a prison for the rest

Elizabeth Renzetti: “Around 9,000 Canadians will end up in hospital each year after slipping and falling on winter ice. Seniors, knowing how devastating and life-altering a fall can be, may choose to sit out the worst weeks. I say ‘choose,’ but it’s hardly a choice. I’ve talked to seniors who spend most of the winter inside, because the city has failed to make outside hospitable to their needs.” (for subscribers)

Does Ottawa feel the pain in Alberta’s oil industry?

Globe editorial: “At times it feels like Trudeau could personally drive Alberta oil to port in Vancouver and his commitment would still be suspect. But telling exasperated voters that Alberta’s current shortage of pipeline capacity is proof that none will ever be built under an eastward-leaning Liberal government is an effective Conservative Party talking point.”

How the nineties are coming back to haunt us

Chris Frey: “No matter how well or harshly you judge the decade’s music, films, fads or fashions, this recycling is largely to be expected, given nostalgia’s tendency to follow something like a 20-year cycle. Though it also feels increasingly like we’re living through the decade’s revenge, the nineties put through a Black Mirror random story generator.” Chris Frey is a five-time National Magazine Award-winner, the Toronto correspondent for Monocle magazine and the founding editor of Hazlitt.

TODAY’S EDITORIAL CARTOON

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LIVING BETTER

Could more daylight benefit dementia patients?

A long-term-care facility in Montreal is hoping to answer that question as it switches to brighter light fixtures and makes adjustments to allow more sunlight to enter its rooms. Scientists have long recognized changing light exposure can alter sleep-wake cycles. But now, Wency Leung reports, they’re also learning about the stimulating effects of light on the brain – the kind of instant clearing of the cobwebs that happens when you step outside on a sunny day.

MOMENT IN TIME

The Globe’s printing presses, 1939

For more than 100 years, photographers and photo librarians working for The Globe and Mail have preserved an extraordinary collection of 20th-century news photography. Every Monday, The Globe features one of these images. In March, we’re looking back at The Globe through the ages.

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In this photo taken by Globe staff photographer Ronny Jaques in 1939, pressmen with The Globe and Mail work on the printing press for the next edition of the paper. The press, in the basement of The Globe’s building at 140 King St. W., between King Street and York Street in downtown Toronto, was an integral part in printing millions of copies of the newspaper, which would then be sent out for circulation to readers. Having outgrown the King Street office in the earlier part of the 1970s, The Globe’s staff put the paper to bed for the last time in this building on Feb. 16, 1974. The Globe moved to its next location, 444 Front St. W., previously home of the Toronto Telegram, where the printing press could churn out 60,000 copies of the paper in an hour. – Shelby Blackley

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Editor’s note: (March 13, 2019) An earlier version of this article used incorrect names for two Canadian victims. Amina Ibrahim Odowa was incorrectly identified with the surname Odowaa. Her daughter Sofia was incorrectly identified as Safiya.