DW-World.de
Deutsche Welle

The airline Spanair says its plane, which crashed in Madrid with 153 fatalities on Wednesday, had a mechanical fault. Spanair said the pilot of the plane registered an air intake problem, but that this was fixed before the plane's first attempt to take off. Investigators are still trying to establish why the McDonnell Douglas MD-82 aircraft veered off the runway during its second attempted take-off. Spanish media have reported that one of the plane's engines was on fire at the time. Earlier on Thursday, Spaniards held a minute's silence for the victims of the crash. Germany's foreign ministry says it expects four Germans are among the dead. Only 19 people on board the plane survived, and many of them are in a critical condition.