As an independent consultant who is in regular contact with the official investication on behalf of some of the victims’ families, I can only comment on issues I have discussed with Captain Tsolakis, the chief investigator, the NTSB and Boeing, as matters of public record.
Regarding the aircraft’s inspection history as presented in parliament by Communication Minister Thrasou, it is important to differentiate between regular or routine checks (which may be carried out two or three times daily, depending on the number of scheduled flights per day) and special inspections undertaken following a report logged by the crew of possible technical problems during a previous flight.
Mr Thrasou’s confirmation that the plane was undergoing continuous inspections - since its registration with Helios Airways in April 2004 - is hardly reassuring as a clean bill of health about its airworthiness.
On December 7, 2004 a mechanical inspection of the plane was conducted by the maintenance company’s specialised mechanics in the presence of a Civil Aviation Department inspector in Larnaca.
Note that the above inspection took place barely nine days before the aircraft suffered a serious incident of Decompression at 34,000 feet on December 16, 2004.
The subsequent investigation by the Cypriot Accident Investigation Board, headed by Costas Orphanos, failed to arrive at a definite conclusion regarding the causes of that pressurisation failure. Orphanos’ Investigation Report, issued one month later, made no mention of any FDR data being retrieved and assessed during that investigation or after the plane was flown to ATCLasham, UK, for further checks and equipment overhaul.
The same cursory reference to later unscheduled inspections raises more questions about the unspecified recurrent problems the Helios crews have had with this particular aircraft in the weeks prior to its final flight:
In March last year a Civil Aviation Department inspector travelled on board the aircraft and carried out an in-flight inspection. On June 8 and 9 inspectors from the Civil Aviation Department inspected the private airline company’s technical department and, among others things, the specific aircraft’s log book, said Thrasou. A month later [July] Civil Aviation Department officials met with the UK company to discuss Helios Airways’ aircraft maintenance matters. Then on August 5, nine days before the crash, the Boeing 737-700 underwent a ground inspection by inspectors and officials of the Civil Aviation Department (flight operations). “Any problems that arose during the inspection were dealt with and the flight was deemed flight worthy,” he said.
These intensified inspections were obviously related to at least five incidents of (reported) electrical malfunctions in the plane’s air-conditioning system, within two months prior to the crash, which Mr Tsolakis had confirmed in his first interview with Flight International on August 22, 2005.
The five incidents include the problems reported in the penultimate flight which necessitated a “full pressurisation test” on the ground three hours before the fateful flight on August 14. Mr Thrasou failed to mention this last inspection as another proof of the aircraft’s flight-worthiness, something which Mr Tsolakis himself has disputed on several occasions.
With hindsight, I don’t see how someone can say that this inspection record doesn't sound like anything out of the ordinary.