Garuda Indonesia Airlines has indicated that it will contest any charges of criminal manslaughter which may be brought against one of its pilots, who is blamed by a recent Japanese report for the 1996 fatal crash of a McDonnell Douglas DC-10-30 at Fukuoka Airport.
Three Japanese passengers were killed after one of the aircraft's General Electric CF6-50C engines failed on rotation and the pilot elected to abort the take-off. The aircraft came to rest well off the runway and caught fire.
The report from the Japanese Aircraft Accident Investigation Commission (AAIC) says that the crash, on 13 June, resulted from "-the fact the captain's judgement in the event of the engine failure was inadequate". The DC-10-30 (PK-GIE) had already passed rotation speed (Vr - 157kt/290km/h), attained an airspeed of 162kt and was lifting off when the No 3 (right) engine failed following the separation of a high-pressure turbine blade.
The DC-10's operating manual says that a take-off rejection should be made before decision speed (V1, 149kt in this case) or, exceptionally, "-where-conditions render [the aircraft] unflyable". V1 is the speed above which the aircraft will overrun the runway if an abort is made. The AAIC concludes from flight-data recorder (FDR) and cockpit-voice recorder read-outs that the crew should have continued with the take-off. Nos 1 and 2 engines were producing full power shortly after V1 and, "-except for the No 3 engine, there were no anomalies which contributed to the accident", says the report.
Indonesia's AAIC has countered that the pilot's observation of a lack of positive climb, "abruptly" decreasing airspeed and "involuntary" pitch-down is at odds with FDR results and that airspeed indicators need therefore to be bench tested. It also cites other factors, including the failure of the autopilot control-wheel-steering (CWS) mode earlier in the take-off run, a possible fuel imbalance, 0.03s of unusable FDR information and the flight engineer calling: "Engine failure, number one," instead of engine No 3.
The Japanese report, however, rules out the failure of the CWS, an autopilot mode controlling pitch or speed, but allowing manual heading control. It also notes a continual application of right rudder up to 140kt, and that the captain had started the abort before the engineer made his incorrect engine-failure call. The AAICfindings and a police report will now go the public prosecutor.o
Source: Flight International
