Flight 990 was 100% proven to be an intentional act. Just because the Egypt govt. doesn’t accept the findings doesn’t make it any less so. The govt. of Egypt acted like a man convicted of murder who was dragged from the courtroom screaming “I’m innocent!”.
Not only did every piece of evidence(cockpit recordings, black box, etc) point to First Officer Gameel Al-Batouti crashing the plane intentionally, but there not a SINGLE piece of evidence that pointed towards ANY other possible cause. Not one.
Instead of doing the morally right thing and accepting the NTSB findings, the Egyptian govt simply said “no way!” and refused to accept this. They went into a state of chronic denial.
The US, in trying to be “PC” and keep some diplomacy, caved a bit and modified the findings wordings so as to leave a little wiggle room.
A very shameful thing.
To this day, it remains one of the worst mass murders in US history.
I think you’re absolutely right.
The fact that you found this thread on your first day at FR is amazing, however ; )
Actually, the NTSB’s finding were put in a rather vague language as stated in their 2002 report:
“The NTSB determines that the probable cause of the EgyptAir flight 990 accident is the airplane’s departure from normal cruise flight and subsequent impact with the Atlantic Ocean as a result of the relief first officer’s flight control inputs. The reason for the relief first officer’s actions was not determined.”
This is why the Egyptions refused to accept that the relief first officer dived the plane deliberately.
It was a deliberate act of terrorism which the NTSB failed to defined as such.