- "We cannot exclude either accident or criminal cause,"
Michel Wachenheim, head of France's Civil Aviation Authority, said yesterday.
-
- French naval teams began searching yesterday for flight
recorders from an Egyptian Flash Airlines jet that suddenly and mysteriously
dived into the Red Sea less than two minutes after takeoff.
-
- Data from the recorders - if they can be found more than
400 metres underwater - could point to a terrorist strike, flight-control
problems or maintenance failures as investigators attempt to determine
what sent the twin-engine Boeing 737 jet plunging into the sea, killing
all 148 on board.
-
- Most of them were French tourists headed home after holidaying
at a Sharm el-Sheikh resort, but flight crew member Ashraf Hamid was a
dual Canadian-Egyptian citizen.
-
- Egyptian authorities were quick to blame unspecified
technical problems, but a previously unknown Islamic group claimed yesterday
that it had downed the airliner and several aspects of the crash raised
troubling questions. Several other Boeing 737s have crashed after suffering
rudder malfunctions at low altitudes.
-
- A caller saying he represented a radical Islamist group
in Yemen, Ansar el-Haq (Apostles of Truth) telephoned Agence France-Presse
in Cairo to say the aircraft had been downed in an "attack."
-
- The caller warned of future attacks against Air France
flights unless the French government rescinded a law that bans Muslim students
from wearing headscarves in public schools.
-
- Although no evidence of terrorism has emerged, the relatively
low altitude of the aircraft - about 1,600 metres - as it climbed away
from Sharm el-Sheikh airport put it well within range of small, shoulder-fired
surface-to-air missiles.
-
- "We cannot exclude either accident or criminal cause,"
Michel Wachenheim, head of France's Civil Aviation Authority, said yesterday.
-
- Using such missiles, terrorists narrowly missed an Israeli
charter aircraft shortly after takeoff in Kenya just over a year ago.
-
- In November, a DHL cargo flight was hit and seriously
damaged by a similar missile as it climbed away from Baghdad airport. Aviation
authorities regard the small, portable missiles - thousands of which remain
unaccounted for around the globe - as a serious threat to commercial aviation.
-
- The 10-year-old Boeing 737 aircraft, leased by Egyptian
charter company Flash Airlines, had made a planned left turn before suddenly
- and with no warning - turning to the right and then diving into the sea.
-
- The crew did not contact air-traffic control, apparently
having no time to do so. The high-speed impact shattered the aircraft and
its passengers. So far the recovery effort has found nothing to point to
the cause of the crash.
-
- A heat-seeking missile, homing in on one of the two jet
engines, could cripple the aircraft without the relatively small warhead
damaging the fuselage.
-
- None of the mostly tiny pieces of wreckage and human
remains recovered so far bear signs of explosion or burning.
-
- Several older Boeing 737s have crashed after rudder problems
at low altitudes that threw the aircraft out of control.
-
- Other instances of the rudder jamming or swinging from
one side to the other have upset Boeing 737s but flight crews have managed
to avert crashes.
-
- More than 4,000 Boeing 737s - the most common jetliner
in the world - remain in service.
-
- The medium-range jet first flew in 1967 and variants
continue to be built.
-
- In 2000, U.S. aviation authorities ordered that new Boeing
737s be built with a different rudder-control mechanism and demanded nearly
3,000 older models be retrofitted.
-
- Airlines, however, were given until 2006 to complete
the retrofit. Most foreign aviation authorities followed the U.S. lead
in making the retrofit mandatory.
-
- A Boeing spokeswoman said yesterday the company is checking
its records to determine whether either of Flash Airline's two Boeing 737s
had been retrofitted with the new rudder-control systems.
-
- "Anything that is being said now - whether it is
terrorism or technical problems - all these are guesses," Mohamed
Nour, chairman and chief operating officer of Flash Airlines, said yesterday.
-
- Although the investigation will be headed by Egyptian
authorities, U.S. and French accident investigators are also involved.
-
- A small remotely piloted French submersible will attempt
to recover the flight data and cockpit voice recorders, which are designed
to withstand enormous crash forces, once they are located. The so-called
black boxes - which are actually orange - emit locating signals that last
for weeks. "Once we have located the wreck and the black boxes, we
can deploy the submarine robot," French Naval Commander Axel Moracchini
said. Homing signals from one of the devices were detected yesterday, according
to French officials.
-
- © 2004 Bell Globemedia Publishing Inc. All Rights
Reserved.
-
- http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20040106.wegyptair
0106/BNStory/International/
|
