Health officials said Wednesday they would have to use DNA tests to identify charred bodies plucked from the wreckage of an airliner that crashed into hills outside Islamabad. "Most of the dead bodies are in pieces, only body parts, some of them badly burnt... these can only be identified through DNA," Mahmood Jamal, chief of the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) told reporters.
Officials said rescue workers had collected body parts and pieces of charred flesh into bags. "Some 300 body bags, 40 blankets and 10 bundles of rope have been air dropped at the crash site," said the national disaster management authority.