Airbus and American Airlines' tactics 'delayed report'
US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) chairman Ellen Engleman Conners has blasted parties to the American Airlines flight AA587 crash investigation for using tactics she claims slowed the investigation process. She says "lobbying" pressure - in this case by manufacturer Airbus and American Airlines itself - has injected a "cancer into the process, and [in future] we are going to fight against that".
Speaking in Washington DC last week, Engleman Conners said the NTSB expected support and knowledge for the probe into the 12 November 2001 Airbus A300-600R crash, but instead "got lobbied more than in any other investigation - from all sides".
A draft report on the crash of AA587 into New York City's suburbs soon after take-off was reviewed finally by the board in late October, but pressure from the participants had "affected the timeliness of the report", says Engleman Conners. The NTSB wants future investigations of high-profile aircraft accidents to be shorter than the three- to four-year current norm, she says.
The AA587 draft report gives the primary cause for the crash - in which the tail fin snapped off under sideslip aerodynamic loads in excess of design requirements - as excessive rudder input by the first officer. But it also cites as factors the sensitivity of the A300-600 rudder controls and elements of American Airlines' upset recovery training. These contributory factors were the subject of a long, furious argument between Airbus and American.
The NTSB chief did not list specific acts of lobbying, but says the parties took up valuable NTSB time by repeating the same message in different words on several occasions without providing new information.
Airbus responds: "The process is over. The report has been issued. There is really no purpose in debating tactics at this point. The key thing is that the NTSB's report reflects the facts, what they found in their investigation. It doesn't reflect the opinions of any of the parties."
American says: "We believe that we had fruitful productive discussions with board members and staff throughout the process and we firmly believe that our input was critical to the investigation."
STEPHEN TRIMBLE / WASHINGTON DC
Source: Flight International
