Transcript casts doubt on Erebus report
Sat "Dominion Post"
Transcript casts doubt on Erebus report
04 December 2004
By DAVID MCLOUGHLIN
Just-revealed transcripts from the cockpit voice recorder of the Air New Zealand jet that crashed on Mt Erebus in 1979 are crucially different from the published version used to blame the pilots for the disaster.
Retired Air New Zealand captain Arthur Cooper has come forward with the original transcripts of the flight deck conversations from flight TE901, which crashed in Antarctica 25 years ago, killing all 257 on board.
Mr Cooper was part of the team that transcribed the plane's voice recorder in Washington days after the crash, but their work has never been released.
Instead, an amended version of the transcript, with many important differences and additions, was published in the 1980 report of chief air accidents inspector Ron Chippindale, who blamed pilot error for the crash.
The Chippindale transcript has been criticised in the past, including by Justice Peter Mahon, whose 1981 royal commission report blamed a computer blunder for the crash, but this is the first time the original transcript has been made public for comparison.
One oft-quoted phrase from the Chippindale report has an unidentified crew member saying "Bit thick here, eh Bert?" to support suggestions that the DC10 was lost and flying in clouds.
But there was no "Bert" in the crew, and passenger photos developed after the crash showed the jet was flying at all times clear of clouds.
Now it can be revealed that the phrase, and many others, does not appear in the original transcript, which was made using sophisticated equipment at the headquarters of the United States National Transportation Safety Board in Washington.
Mr Cooper approached The Dominion Post with the transcript after a television reconstruction during last week's 25th anniversary used the "Bert" quote and other disputed comments. He wanted the record set right before the "mythical transcript" became accepted as fact.
The original was the most accurate transcript possible, and neither Mr Chippindale nor Justice Mahon could have improved on it from their own listening to the CVR tape, he said. The "bit thick" phrase was not on the tape.
But Mr Chippindale stands by his transcript.
He said he did considerable work on the tape after the original transcript was prepared.
"As far as I'm concerned we have the best reconstruction we could get at the time."
However, he might have got the name "Bert" wrong while listening to the tape.
"But the `bit thick here' comment was there," he said.
The differences were only minor and he did not see any point in arguing over it again now.
"The pilots, the airline, the investigators have all had a good going over during the past 25 years and it would be kinder for everyone involved, wherever the blame lies, for it to stop," he said.
The original transcript also reveals that the phrases "Where's Mt Erebus?" and "where are we?" were added in the Chippindale report. At the time it was said they showed the crew did not know where they were.
Justice Mahon's report said that TE901 crashed because the airline changed the navigation computer without telling the pilots, sending the jet into Mt Erebus instead of over the flat McMurdo Sound.
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