Air France probe finds pilot errors

Five Britons and three Irish citizens died when an Air France jet crashed in the Atlantic (AP)
12 April 2012

The crew piloting an Air France jet which crashed into the Atlantic, killing five Britons, did not appear to know that the plane was in a stall despite repeated warning signals, according to findings in a new report.

They never informed the passengers that anything was wrong before the airliner plunged into the sea, killing all 228 on board.

Based on cockpit recordings from the crash, the French air accident investigation agency BEA is recommending mandatory training for all pilots to help them fly planes manually and handle a high-altitude stall.

The Airbus 330, en route from Rio de Janeiro to Paris, crashed amid thunderstorms over the Atlantic on June 1, 2009. It was the worst accident in Air France's history. The victims also included three Irish citizens.

The passengers were never told what was happening as Flight 447 went into an aerodynamic stall and then dived for three-and-a-half minutes into the sea, according to a summary of the BEA's latest findings released on Friday.

The pilots themselves may not have been aware they were in the stall even as it was dooming the flight, the summary says.

The BEA will release a fuller report later on Friday, based on cockpit voice and data recorders retrieved from the ocean depths in May in an exceptionally long and costly search operation.

The summary confirms that external speed sensors obstructed by ice crystals produced irregular speed readings on the plane. Since the accident, Air France has replaced the speed monitors on all its Airbus A330 and A340 aircraft.

The BEA says neither of the co-pilots at the controls had received recent training for manual aircraft handling or had any high-altitude schooling in case of unreliable air speed readings. A stall warning sounded numerous times, and once for a full 54 seconds, but the crew made no reference to it in cockpit exchanges before the jet crashed, according to the BEA.

There was no evidence of task-sharing during the crisis by the two co-pilots in the cockpit at the time, according to the BEA's findings. The captain was on a rest break when the warnings began.

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