Europe In Mourning After Germanwings Plane Crash

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"Nothing but debris and bodies" reads French daily Libération"s front page, conveying the state of shock and disbelief around Europe the day after an Airbus A320 carrying 150 people crashed in the southern French Alps.

According to Alain Vidalies, France's junior minister of transport, there were no survivors from the crash of flight 4U9525. Search operations for the plane's black boxes resumed Wednesday morning in the hard-to-reach area. Retrieving and identifying the 150 bodies will take weeks, Marseille Prosecutor General Brice Robin said.

French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said one of the plane's two black boxes was recovered from the crash site. It is reportedly "in a damaged but usable" state, and will help shed light on the causes of the crash. So far, no hypotheses have been ruled out.

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Sixty-seven Germans, 45 Spaniards, two Australians and three Britons were on board the plane that was travelling from Barcelona to Dusseldorf.

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"Not arrived" writes Berlin-based Die Tageszeitung, together with a simple yet poignant picture of an airport flight information screen in Düsseldorf, where the plane — operated by Germanwings, a Lufthansa budget airline — was supposed to land.

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"Under shock," headlines Hamburg Morgenpost as 67 German passengers — including 16 students and their two teachers returning from a school exchange — are among the victims of the crash.

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Spanish daily El Mundo featured a picture of the crash site, while wondering why "The plane fell for 8 minutes without sending a mayday call." (Investigators now believe the aircraft actually slowly lost altitude for 18 minutes)

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Flight 4U9525 took off from Barcelona's airport, but it was a "Flight without a destination," writes Spanish daily ABC.

Premium stories from Worldcrunch's own network of multi-lingual journalists in over 30 countries.

Europe In Mourning After Germanwings Plane Crash

[rebelmouse-image 27088793 alt="""" original_size="600x817" expand=1]

"Nothing but debris and bodies" reads French daily Libération"s front page, conveying the state of shock and disbelief around Europe the day after an Airbus A320 carrying 150 people crashed in the southern French Alps.

According to Alain Vidalies, France's junior minister of transport, there were no survivors from the crash of flight 4U9525. Search operations for the plane's black boxes resumed Wednesday morning in the hard-to-reach area. Retrieving and identifying the 150 bodies will take weeks, Marseille Prosecutor General Brice Robin said.

French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said one of the plane's two black boxes was recovered from the crash site. It is reportedly "in a damaged but usable" state, and will help shed light on the causes of the crash. So far, no hypotheses have been ruled out.

[rebelmouse-image 27088794 alt="""" original_size="750x1189" expand=1]

Sixty-seven Germans, 45 Spaniards, two Australians and three Britons were on board the plane that was travelling from Barcelona to Dusseldorf.

[rebelmouse-image 27088795 alt="""" original_size="750x1119" expand=1]

"Not arrived" writes Berlin-based Die Tageszeitung, together with a simple yet poignant picture of an airport flight information screen in Düsseldorf, where the plane — operated by Germanwings, a Lufthansa budget airline — was supposed to land.

[rebelmouse-image 27088796 alt="""" original_size="750x991" expand=1]

"Under shock," headlines Hamburg Morgenpost as 67 German passengers — including 16 students and their two teachers returning from a school exchange — are among the victims of the crash.

[rebelmouse-image 27088797 alt="""" original_size="750x1038" expand=1]

Spanish daily El Mundo featured a picture of the crash site, while wondering why "The plane fell for 8 minutes without sending a mayday call." (Investigators now believe the aircraft actually slowly lost altitude for 18 minutes)

[rebelmouse-image 27088798 alt="""" original_size="750x1038" expand=1]

Flight 4U9525 took off from Barcelona's airport, but it was a "Flight without a destination," writes Spanish daily ABC.

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What's Driving More Venezuelans To Migrate To The U.S.

With dimmed hopes of a transition from the economic crisis and repressive regime of Nicolas Maduro, many Venezuelans increasingly see the United States, rather than Latin America, as the place to rebuild a life..

Photo of a family of Migrants from Venezuela crossing the Rio Grande between Mexico and the U.S. to surrender to the border patrol with the intention of requesting humanitarian asylum

Migrants from Venezuela crossed the Rio Grande between Mexico and the U.S. to surrender to the border patrol with the intention of requesting humanitarian asylum.

David Peinado via Zuma Press

Julio Borges

-Analysis-

Migration has too many elements to count. Beyond the matter of leaving your homeland, the process creates a gaping emptiness inside the migrant — and outside, in their lives. If forced upon someone, it can cause psychological and anthropological harm, as it involves the destruction of roots. That's in fact the case of millions of Venezuelans who have left their country without plans for the future or pleasurable intentions.

Their experience is comparable to paddling desperately in shark-infested waters. As many Mexicans will concur, it is one thing to take a plane, and another to pay a coyote to smuggle you to some place 'safe.'

Venezuela's mass emigration of recent years has evolved in time. Initially, it was the middle and upper classes and especially their youth, migrating to escape the socialist regime's socio-political and economic policies. Evidently, they sought countries with better work, study and business opportunities like the United States, Panama or Spain. The process intensified after 2017 when the regime's erosion of democratic structures and unrelenting economic vandalism were harming all Venezuelans.

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