Originally Posted by
212man
Doctored to suggest what? It's a while since I've read them, but my recollection is that the the crew were essentially demonstrating that they were lost, and the polar explorer in the jump seat was helping them with a 'risky shift' based adaptation of what they could see versus what they expected to see. This feeling of comfort helped offset clues like losing VOR and RT with McMurdo base (blocked by the mountain!)
212. My apologies for tardy reply. I completely missed your post.
Regarding the CVR recording, a transcript was made by the NTSB in Washington, and agreed by the 'CVR Committee'. Air New Zealand's investigator and chief pilot then took it upon themselves to make 55 changes; mostly adding words and phrases, and on one occasion completely deleting an entire phrase. No investigation protocol permits such a thing. At the very least the Committee is reconvened and a formal decision made on any proposed 'error'.
ANZ said the pilots knew they were heading for Erebus. But their briefing notes indicated otherwise. They had been given the wrong route. This error was known by the chief pilot, but not the lead investigator. The folder containing the briefing was recovered intact, but by the time it was returned to NZ for analysis the relevant pages had been removed. ANZ also visited the homes of deceased aircrew and removed other copies of the notes.
ANZ always denied this, but the chief pilot, Capt Gemmell, confessed to it on his deathbed. The CE of ANZ had ordered the shredding of all relevant material.