Posted on 11/16/2001 1:13:44 PM PST by kattracks
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The engines powering ill-fated American Airlines Flight 587 continued to run after the crew reported that it was having problems controlling the Airbus A300, investigators said on Wednesday night.
The National Transportation Safety Board also said that investigators had found the plane's maintenance log book amid the wreckage in Queens, and said it did not raise any red flags about its service record.
The updated information about the two huge General Electric CF6-series engines came from more detailed analysis of the plane's cockpit voice recorder, which picks up crew conversations and a range of other aircraft noises.
The fact that the engines continued to run after the crew reported control problems was another indication pointing away from engine failure as a possible cause.
This development followed safety board statements on Tuesday that preliminary examination of the wreckage found no evidence of any internal engine failure.
There was initial speculation the CF6-model engines might be a factor in the crash because of regulatory advisories on potential cracking and fatigue of key parts.
A senior safety board investigator said nothing has been ruled out and no conclusions on engine performance could be drawn yet.
While the log book showed no major entries or problems, the safety board said it could not rule out that a maintenance problem went undetected.
Airbus, based in Toulouse, France, is owned by European Aeronautic, Defense & Space Co and BAE Systems Plc .
I find it hard to believe that the full log book would be on board the aircraft; that is, that the most detailed record of what repairs etc. were made to that particular aircraft would be on the plane.
Tuesday evening on the Fox News Channel program, "O'Reilly Factor," I watched the segment where Bill O'Reilly interviewed "former NTSB investigator" Vernon Grose. While asking questions about the crash of AA 587, O'Reilly said something to the effect that he hoped that the NTSB would not behave like this was a "cover-up," which was the problem surrounding the investigation of TWA 800.
At O'Reilly's association of the word "cover-up" to TWA 800, Vernon Grose reacted positively to this lead-in, which led to O'Reilly's follow-up question. What did Vernon Grose think about the NTSB's official conclusion on TWA 800?
Grose responded that he had interviewed more people than anyone else who worked on the TWA 800 investigation, and that HE WAS NOT SATISFIED with the NTSB's official conclusion for the cause of the crash. ,/b>
However, there was only the implication that there was a cover-up in the TWA 800 investigation. Grose was not explicit, and O'Reilly went on to the next point.
NOTE: The "O'Reilly Factor" program will repeat (Tuesday night) Wednesday morning from 4am-5am, EST, on the Fox News Channel.
I was so surprised at Vernon Grose's comments about a possible TWA-800 coverup of witness testimony to Bill O'Reilly, that I cheered out loud! [My two cats jumped off the sofa and fled...]
A BUMP for the truth this time!
BTW-My 9 kitties just raised their heads, looked my direction and went back to sleep. Lazy cats!LOL
Meanwhile, in Tulsa, the maintenance records group discovered that one of the six main attachments that held the Flight 587 plane's tail to the fuselage underwent a significant repair in 1988, soon after the plane rolled off the assembly line but before it was delivered to American.
The left-center fitting "delaminated," and technicians in Toulouse, France, where the plane was built, added a "doubler" and rivets to reinforce the joint, Black said at the evening briefing. Airbus then delivered the plane to American but did not indicate that special inspections of the repaired area were necessary.
Hmm I wonder how many other such fixes are out there unbeknownst to the owner of the plane. I guess the joint was just "Toulouse" (bad pun)
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