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CNN Live Today
Fatal Flight: Investigators Checking Recent Maintenance
Aired January 10, 2003 - 10:23 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Some new clues are emerging in the probe of Wednesday's deadly plane crash in Charlotte, North Carolina. Areas investigation focus on maintenance that was done on the plane two days before it crashed, also on the luggage that was loaded right before the flight. All 21 people aboard Air Midwest flight were killed after it slammed into a hangar only 37 seconds after takeoff.
Miles O'Brien has been following the investigation. He joins us with more on that right now.
Miles, good morning.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN SPACE CORRESPONDENT: Thanks very much, Daryn.
Really three areas of focus right now for the investigators, as we take a look at the plane, the type of plane involved in this, a Raytheon Beechcraft 1900D, we'll give you the focus. The elevators, which are located in the trailing edge of that particular wing, called the horizontal stabilizer, the luggage area in the rear, the cargo area, how it was loaded, how much weight was in it, and in the cockpit, the pilot's reaction.
Now let's take a look once again at the flight, the 37-second flight path of this particular U.S. Airways flight. This is Charlotte International Airport, Douglas Airport. We're going down to Runway 18-Right right now. And we'll tell you that what happened was it ran -- it went down the runway about the normal length, something less than 4,000 feet, perhaps a lot less than that. Straight down the runway.
As it took off, it took off at a pretty much normal angle of about seven degrees and then suddenly veered very sharply upward. The question is why did it do that? Once it went upward, it lost speed over the wings, stalled out, apparently flipped over, inverted, and then crashed in this vicinity right here of that hangar.
Let's talk a little bit about the elevators first. I was telling you about the three areas of concern. The elevators are located, as I said, on the trailing edge here. Let me highlight where they are right here. They are the -- they don't elevate, that is a big myth. They don't have the plane climb or descend, they simply change the pitch of the nose up or down. A little bit of aviation 101, take me back to my preliminary textbooks in flying years ago, when the pilot pulls back on the stick, the elevator does this, the nose goes up. The converse of that, going down, push down on the stick or the wheel and the elevator puts that in a position where the nose goes down. Now, the question is was there a mechanical problem, which caused that elevator to go upward, or was there some other factor involved? And where the focus is on that rear cargo area. It is able to hold 1,600 pounds of luggage, but there is a cargo net in there. It can hold 1,000 pounds on the forward side of the cargo net and 600 pounds on the aft side of the cargo net. Is it possible that it was loaded with too many bags after the cargo net? Did the cargo net break free? Were there, perhaps, bags which tumbled over? A lot of issue that might have put the plane with its -- the aft section too heavy, forcing the pilot to put it in that tremendous pitch upward. Now those are the issues.
The NTSB tells us that the plane was not overloaded, has a max gross weight of about 17,000 pounds. According to the paperwork, it took off about 100 pounds light.
Now just been handed a note, apparently the airline is finished inspecting the three aircraft which had undergone similar maintenance checks at the West Virginia facility where this occurred and this recent maintenance occurred on the plane that was in the crash. As a further precaution, the company which owns this aircraft, Mesa Air, which is a holding company for Midwest Airlines, which is a subcontractor to U.S. Airways, sorry to give you all that convoluted tale, they're inspecting today and tomorrow the elevator controllers on their entire fleet of those 1900Ds. That's just in to us right now.
So focus, once again, on that elevator control, the cargo hold, how the pilot reacted to all that. And as often happens in these cases, Daryn, when the final report is written by the National Transportation Safety Board, it might very well be some combination of all three.
KAGAN: All right, we will be tracking it. Miles, thank you so much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired January 10, 2003 - 10:23 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Some new clues are emerging in the probe of Wednesday's deadly plane crash in Charlotte, North Carolina. Areas investigation focus on maintenance that was done on the plane two days before it crashed, also on the luggage that was loaded right before the flight. All 21 people aboard Air Midwest flight were killed after it slammed into a hangar only 37 seconds after takeoff.
Miles O'Brien has been following the investigation. He joins us with more on that right now.
Miles, good morning.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN SPACE CORRESPONDENT: Thanks very much, Daryn.
Really three areas of focus right now for the investigators, as we take a look at the plane, the type of plane involved in this, a Raytheon Beechcraft 1900D, we'll give you the focus. The elevators, which are located in the trailing edge of that particular wing, called the horizontal stabilizer, the luggage area in the rear, the cargo area, how it was loaded, how much weight was in it, and in the cockpit, the pilot's reaction.
Now let's take a look once again at the flight, the 37-second flight path of this particular U.S. Airways flight. This is Charlotte International Airport, Douglas Airport. We're going down to Runway 18-Right right now. And we'll tell you that what happened was it ran -- it went down the runway about the normal length, something less than 4,000 feet, perhaps a lot less than that. Straight down the runway.
As it took off, it took off at a pretty much normal angle of about seven degrees and then suddenly veered very sharply upward. The question is why did it do that? Once it went upward, it lost speed over the wings, stalled out, apparently flipped over, inverted, and then crashed in this vicinity right here of that hangar.
Let's talk a little bit about the elevators first. I was telling you about the three areas of concern. The elevators are located, as I said, on the trailing edge here. Let me highlight where they are right here. They are the -- they don't elevate, that is a big myth. They don't have the plane climb or descend, they simply change the pitch of the nose up or down. A little bit of aviation 101, take me back to my preliminary textbooks in flying years ago, when the pilot pulls back on the stick, the elevator does this, the nose goes up. The converse of that, going down, push down on the stick or the wheel and the elevator puts that in a position where the nose goes down. Now, the question is was there a mechanical problem, which caused that elevator to go upward, or was there some other factor involved? And where the focus is on that rear cargo area. It is able to hold 1,600 pounds of luggage, but there is a cargo net in there. It can hold 1,000 pounds on the forward side of the cargo net and 600 pounds on the aft side of the cargo net. Is it possible that it was loaded with too many bags after the cargo net? Did the cargo net break free? Were there, perhaps, bags which tumbled over? A lot of issue that might have put the plane with its -- the aft section too heavy, forcing the pilot to put it in that tremendous pitch upward. Now those are the issues.
The NTSB tells us that the plane was not overloaded, has a max gross weight of about 17,000 pounds. According to the paperwork, it took off about 100 pounds light.
Now just been handed a note, apparently the airline is finished inspecting the three aircraft which had undergone similar maintenance checks at the West Virginia facility where this occurred and this recent maintenance occurred on the plane that was in the crash. As a further precaution, the company which owns this aircraft, Mesa Air, which is a holding company for Midwest Airlines, which is a subcontractor to U.S. Airways, sorry to give you all that convoluted tale, they're inspecting today and tomorrow the elevator controllers on their entire fleet of those 1900Ds. That's just in to us right now.
So focus, once again, on that elevator control, the cargo hold, how the pilot reacted to all that. And as often happens in these cases, Daryn, when the final report is written by the National Transportation Safety Board, it might very well be some combination of all three.
KAGAN: All right, we will be tracking it. Miles, thank you so much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
