Continental Found Guilty in Concorde Crash: Why the Verdict Was Wrong
On July 25, 2000, an Air France Concorde crashed just outside of Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport, killing 113 people. The tragedy had the net effect of first grounding all Concordes, and ultimately contributed to the plane going out of service entirely.
And now, more than 10 years after the fatal accident, a French court has found Continental Airlines guilty of involuntary manslaughter. Continental? For an Air France accident?
The charges against Continental stemmed from the fact that prior to the Concorde taking off, a Continental Airlines DC-10 roared down the same runway, and on take-off, a small piece of titanium dropped from one of its engines. Then, when the Concorde started its takeoff roll, one of the tires hit that small strip of metal, the tire exploded, ripped into one of the fuel tanks on the wing, and started a fast chain of events that led to the crash of the supersonic plane.
The Facts Don't Support the Verdict
I investigated the crash for more than nine years and talked to numerous credible eyewitnesses, read the French accident report, and studied everything about the Concorde, its design, its tires, the flight crew, and a series of events on that fateful day that led up to the crash. This resulted in a one-hour Dateline NBC special on the crash that aired in 2009.
My conclusions are at odds with both the French accident report as well as the most recent verdict. And I firmly believe the fate of the Concorde was sealed before it ever pushed back from the gate that July afternoon.
Consider this: This particular Concorde was overweight. It was overfueled. It lacked a critical part (which Air France maintenance forgot to put back on the plane before flight). Its tires were defective (and we discovered dozens of cases of defective Concorde tires that disintegrated on take off on other planes). To make matters worse, before takeoff, the tower advised the Concorde pilots that the wind direction had changed and that instead of a desired headwind, the pilot now had a tailwind. Instead of choosing another runway, the pilot still chose to use the original runway.
Credible Eyewitnesses Ignored
The French accident investigators chose to ignore the four most credible eyewitnesses: two French firemen at the airport, who reported seeing fire and smoke from the Concorde way before the plane could have ever hit the metal strip; an American Airlines pilot, who also saw smoke and flames from the supersonic plane before it ever could have hit the metal strip; and, perhaps most convincingly, the chief pilot for French President Jacques Chirac, who was sitting in the cockpit of the presidential 747 waiting for the Concorde to take off, and who also witnessed the entire series of events.
As the Concorde veered off the runway, and onto the grass, trailing 150 feet of flame, it headed straight for the presidential plane. At the last second, the Concorde pilot realized he was going too fast to stop and too slow to take off. He did the only thing possible ... he pulled back on the yoke and the plane jerked into the sky -- barely missing President Chirac's plane by about 30 feet. It was THAT close.
But despite these credible eyewitnesses, the French accident report downplayed their reports. It also dismissed any significance of the missing stabilizer bar from the plane, which investigators only found in a maintenance hangar a few days after the crash.
Concorde, Overfueled and Overloaded
And then, there were the actions of the Concorde cockpit crew on the doomed flight. They knew the plane was overweight and that excess bags were packed at the last minute. They also knew the plane was overfueled and chose to ignore that as well. When part of the tire slammed into one of the fuel tanks, it created a sonic wave that didn't just rupture the tank, but allowed the tank to explode and send fuel gushing into one of the engine air intakes, creating a fire.
Inside the cockpit, as fire warning lights flashed and alarms rang, the flight engineer did the unthinkable. Without asking the pilot for permission, he shut down one of the engines -- an engine that was still producing essential thrust.
At this point, the plane became unflyable. Seconds later, it pitched up, stalled and basically pancaked into a small hotel, killing four on the ground. Ironically, the supersonic plane hit the hotel at just 74 mph.
In the court case, there were official damages to Air France's reputation and Continental has been ordered to pay $1.43 million to Air France in addition to fines of around $265,000.
Culpable French Officials Acquitted
Continental has called the ruling "absurd" and also argued that the verdict was "patriotic" in that it punished Americans, but has acquitted culpable French officials. Air France was not even a defendant in this case, despite the evidence. Former Concorde president, Henri Perrier, and two other French airline regulators were cleared of blame, despite ignoring warnings of tire malfunctions on the jet.
Did the Continental jet drop that piece of metal on the runway? Yes. Was it directly responsible for the crash of the Concorde? Based on my investigation. .. I'd have to conclude it was not.
