All 160 Martiniquans on board a Colombian airliner flying from Panama to Martinique, were killed when their plane slammed into a hill in northwestern Venezuela early Tuesday morning. They'd been returning from a holiday in Panama. Eight crew members working for the Colombian airline, West Caribbean Airways, also died. Trouble Air traffic controllers lost contact with the MD-82 plane soon after the pilot reported engine problems and asked to make an emergency landing at Maracaibo airport. The pilot then reported that the second engine was also failing and the aircraft began to lose altitude by about 7,000ft , Venezuela's Interior Minister reported. "Residents in the area said they heard an explosion," aviation official Francisco Paz said. Martinique mourns The reaction in Martinique was one of tremendous shock, with disbelieving relatives at the airport unable to contain their grief. In France, president Jacques Chirac, has ordered a crisis centre to be set up for relatives of the victims. Reprinted from bbccaribbean.com