US airline faces Concorde strife

PARIS - A shard of metal which fell from a Continental Airlines jet and a weakness in Concorde's design caused the Paris crash in July 2000 which killed 113, a French prosecutor said yesterday.

Although the provisional findings of the criminal investigation closely followed those of the official accident report three years ago, they could open the way to legal action against Continental officials and ground staff.

Paris staff of the American company have to give evidence to an investigating judge in February, and senior executives in the United States, including the chief executive, Gordon Bethune, have been asked to attend a similar hearing in March.

Lawyers for the families of victims said they would push for Continental officials to be placed under formal investigation, one step short of a charge, but prosecution officials said this was not yet envisaged.

The interim report of the judicial investigation also criticised the makers and operators of Concorde - Aerospatiale, British Aerospace, Air France and British Airways - for failing to take thorough action to correct a weakness in the wing fuel tanks, first uncovered in 1979.

The investigating judges also criticised "weaknesses" in the training of the Air France Concorde pilots, who failed to respond adequately when the aircraft caught fire, switching off a stuttering engine before it was necessary.

But the investigating judges do not appear to believe these failings amounted to negligence or criminal responsibility, so criminal proceedings for manslaughter against Air France are unlikely.

Whether it would be possible to bring such charges against Continental employees or chiefs is not clear.

The US-bound Concorde burst into flames soon after takeoff from Charles de Gaulle Airport and hit a hotel at Gonesse, 4.8km away.

 

After a four-year investigation, including a near-complete reassembly of the fragmented aircraft, the investigating judges said the "immediate cause" of the accident was a burst tyre, caused by a piece of titanium dropped on the runway by the Continental jumbo jet in front of the Concorde.

The debris from the tyre penetrated a wing, causing a fire in a petrol tank, which led the aircraft to lose power, fail to gain sufficient height on takeoff and then crash.

The vulnerability of Concorde wings to such a tyre burst had been known since 1979, the report said, but inadequate steps had been taken to correct the problem.

The metal "wear-strip" which fell from an engine housing of the Continental Boeing 747 that had been poorly fitted by Continental ground staff in Paris was made of titanium alloy, the report said.

US aviation safety regulations require that aluminium should be used. Titanium is tougher than aluminium and likely to cause more damage to the tyres of following aircraft.

FLIGHT INTO HISTORY

* Concorde started flying in March 1969.

* After the crash in 2000, Air France and British Airways grounded their fleets while safety modifications were made to the tyres and wing fuel tanks.

* Flights resumed briefly but the world's only supersonic airliner was finally taken out of service in October last year.

* Some models were given to museums and other showplaces. The makers say Concorde will never fly again.

- INDEPENDENT