ATW Daily News

French BEA: 'Very far' from establishing AF447 crash cause; A330 hit water intact

Friday July 3, 2009

The lead investigator examining the May 31 Air France A330-200 accident said yesterday that malfunctioning pitot probes were "one of the factors but not the only one" that led to the aircraft's going down in the Atlantic Ocean and declined to cite a cause of the crash.

Alain Bouillard, who is leading the French BEA's investigation, also revealed that evidence shows the A330 hit the water intact rather than breaking up in flight. At a Paris press conference in which the accident inquiry agency released its initial findings on the AF447 crash about 400 mi. northeast of the Fernando de Noronha archipelago that killed all 228 passengers and crew, he emphasized that a cause has not been determined. The pitot probes' inconsistent speed measurements were "a factor but not the cause," he said. "Today we are very far from establishing the cause of the accident."

The report released yesterday reiterated that the 24 messages sent over 15 min. by the A330's aircraft communications addressing and reporting system "show inconsistency between the measured speeds as well as the associated consequences" (ATWOnline, June 8).

While the crash's cause has not been pinpointed, Bouillard said an examination of debris found has led to the conclusion that "the plane was not destroyed while it was in flight. It seems to have hit the surface of the water in the direction of flight and with a strong vertical acceleration."

Another focus of the investigation is determining why there was no handover of the flight from Brazil ATC to controllers in Senegal, as is routine when an aircraft is traveling over the Atlantic from Rio de Janeiro to Paris.

Bouillard said the doomed A330's pilots attempted to contact ATC in Dakar three times but were unsuccessful. "This is not normal," he explained. In addition, investigators are puzzled as to why it took ATC in Senegal 6 hr. to realize the aircraft was missing. "We want to know why there was no concern in Dakar when this plane was not handed over," he said. "It is one of the subjects of our investigation: Why so much time elapsed between the last radio contact and declaration of an emergency."

He said the search for the flight data and cockpit voice recorders will continue by current means through July 10. BEA emphasized that the investigation's findings do not indicate a wider safety issue with A330s. "For me there is no problem" with the type's fitness for flight, Bouillard stated.

by Aaron Karp

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