Ethiopian Airlines plane nosedived severally before crash-Report
- Plane maker sued, report paints graphic last minute before tragedy
- Boeing’s reputation plunges
The Ethiopian Airlines plane that crashed last month nosedived several times before it hit the ground, a preliminary report has said. The crash claimed the lives of 157 passengers including two eminent Nigerians, Professor Pius Adesanmi and Ambassador Abiodun Bashua
Already, one lawsuit has been filed. More are likely. The suffering of those who’ve lost loved ones can’t be quantified. But the commercial toll for the manufacturer and damage to its reputation, at this stage is monumental.
The preliminary report of the crash painted a graphic picture of the last minutes of the flight, including details about how the two pilots tried in vain to end the dive together.
“The Captain asked the First Officer to pitch up together and said that pitch is not enough,” the report reads. “The data indicates that aft force was applied to both columns simultaneously several times throughout the remainder of the recording.”
The report does not specifically name the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, which is a stabilization system, but makes it likely the MCAS pushed the plane into a dive fueled by erroneous angle of attack sensor readings. Boeing is currently working on a change to the system’s software.
Flight ET302 crashed after take-off from Addis Ababa, killing 157 people. It was the second crash of a Boeing 737 Max aircraft in five months.Last October, Lion Air flight JT 610 crashed into the sea near Indonesia killing all 189 people on board.
In a news conference in Addis Ababa, Dagmawit said: “The crew performed all the procedures repeatedly provided by the manufacturer but were not able to control the aircraft.”
Her comments were based on a preliminary report into the crash, which has not been published yet, but could be released by the end of the week.
The 737 Max family of aircraft was grounded following the Ethiopian Airlines crash, a move affecting more than 300 planes.
The preliminary report did not attribute blame for the crash. But it says the crew were fully qualified to conduct the flight, and that they performed all the expected procedures correctly.
The report goes on to recommend that Boeing review the 737 Max’s “flight control system related to flight controllability” and that aviation regulators ensure this is done before the aircraft goes back into the air.
Crash investigators have focused their attention on the Manoeuvring Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) – software designed to help prevent the 737 Max from stalling.
The software reacts when sensors in the nose of the aircraft show the jet is climbing at too steep an angle, which can cause a plane to stall.
The report does not mention the MCAS by name, but it does detail during the minutes after take-off the problems the pilots were having in trying to control the aircraft’s angle of flight.
At one point the captain called out three times “pull up”, and seconds after instructed the first officer to tell Air Traffic Control that they had a flight control problem.
Also, the chief executive of Ethiopian Airlines, Tewolde GebreMariam, said he was “very proud” of the pilots’ “high level of professional performance”.
“It was very unfortunate they could not recover the airplane from the persistence of nosediving,” the airline said in a statement.
In a statement yesterday, Boeing said: “We will carefully review the AIB’s preliminary report and will take any and all additional steps necessary to enhance the safety of our aircraft.
“To ensure unintended MCAS activation will not occur again, Boeing has developed and is planning to release a software update to MCAS and an associated comprehensive pilot training and supplementary education program for the 737 MAX.”
The company said the update “adds additional layers of protection and will prevent erroneous data from causing MCAS activation. Flight crews will always have the ability to override MCAS and manually control the airplane”.
Boeing has issued guidance to pilots on how to manage MCAS, and it plans to install an extra warning system on all 737 Max aircraft, which was previously an optional safety feature.
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