By Jenny Horrocks BBC African Productions

Jenny at Kelvin Mutale's graveside

On the morning of 28 April 1993, I was running late for work and scuttled into the office I shared with my colleague Martin Davies who already had his head down working furiously.

"Morning! Sorry I'm late," I said, and his reply was shocking.

"Almost the entire Zambian national team have died in an air crash, the world and its mother are calling us so we need to get moving."

It's not the kind of thing you expect to hear, and my response was one of complete disbelief.... I thought it was a sick joke... but Martin's sense of humour usually makes me laugh, and this did not.

I had spoken to many of that Zambian team only days before on the telephone line to Mauritius.

There, they had won an African Cup of Nations qualifier 3-0 which put them top of their group. I rang their hotel for an interview with the man who had scored a hat-trick, Kelvin Mutale.

Several of the players had passed the phone around to say "hello" before I finally got to Kelvin, who had been named man of the match.

So now they were gone.

On their way to a World Cup qualifier in Senegal, the military plane they flew in had stopped in Gabon for refuelling.

On take off there appeared to be a small explosion and the Buffalo CT15 plunged into the sea.

Details were still coming through from our reporters in Gabon about the search for bodies and the possible causes of this dreadful tragedy.

Our office became like a hub of information coming from Gabon and Zambia with reaction from FA's across the continent, and from Caf and Fifa.

With a heavy heart I called the team's captain Kalusha Bwalya at his home in Holland.

Kalusha had been due to fly from his Dutch club PSV Eindhoven, to join the Zambian team in Senegal, but news of the disaster brought his plans to an emergency stop.

"Hello Kalusha, it's Jenny from the BBC here.... I'm so so sorry about the news."

We talked for around 10 minutes before I plucked up the courage to ask him for an interview. I said that if he didn't want to do it I would understand. But he was the ultimate professional.

"Jenny, I am that captain of the team, and it is my responsibility."

It isn't often one does an interview with tears in your eyes, but this was different for both interviewee and interviewer.

Belgian-based midfielder Charles Musonda was also gracious enough to talk about his "brothers" in a very personal way.

I had been to Musonda's home and I knew that a big picture of the squad took pride of place on top of his TV set. He was holding the picture as he spoke to me.

Martin and I worked until late and were back in early the next morning for another day of hard questions about why the accident happened� a question we still ask today.

Despite a lengthy enquiry, no statement has been forthcoming.

It wasn't until 1999 that I first visited Zambia, and the country's legendary commentator Dennis Liwewe took me to "Heroes' Acre" where the team are buried right next to Independence Stadium outside Lusaka.

There again, the tears flowed as I stood at the graveside of Kelvin Mutale, their hat-trick hero.

Now, 10 years later, I find it hard to stomach that the government is saying that commemorating the anniversary of the Zambian air disaster is not their responsibility, while so many questions still remain unanswered.