hmmm, check out these two articles.
things are starting to look good for the legacy pilots.
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Tower Error Led To Brazil Jet Air Collision - Report
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
November 2, 2006 9:59 a.m.
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP)--The flight recorder transcript from the executive jet involved in Brazil's worst air disaster shows that the jet's American pilots were told by Brazilian air traffic control to fly at the same altitude as a Boeing 737 before the planes collided over the Amazon rainforest, the Folha de S. Paulo newspaper reported Thursday.
According to Folha, the flight recorder shows American pilot Joseph Lepore receiving instructions from the tower in Sao Jose dos Campos to fly northwest at 37,000 feet (11,277 meters) "until Eduardo Gomes," the airport in Manaus. That altitude contradicted the pilots' filed flight plan and as an odd-numbered altitude should be reserved for southbound flights.
Folha did not reveal how it had obtained the transcript, which the air force has not yet released to federal police investigating the Sept. 29 crash. All 154 people on board the Gol airline's 737 were killed. The badly damaged executive jet managed to land safely, and the American pilots have been ordered to stay in Brazil during the investigation.
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http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/americ....ap/index.html
Brazil air controllers decline crash questions
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) -- Ten flight controllers have said they are under psychiatric treatment and declined to be questioned by federal police about a September 29 midair collision that killed 154 people in Brazil's worst air disaster, the government news service reported Tuesday.
A Boeing 737-800 of Gol Linhas Aereas Inteligentes SA, Brazil's No. 2 airline, collided with a Brazilian-made Legacy 600 executive jet over the Amazon jungle of Mato Grosso state. All 154 people aboard the Boeing were killed, while the Legacy landed safely at a nearby air force base.
Federal police inspector Renato Sayao had planned to question the flight controllers, who were assigned to airports in Manaus, in the western Amazon jungle, and Brasilia, the central capital, but the Brazilian Air Force said they were flight controllers were under psychiatric treatment until November 13, Agencia Brasil reported.
The flight data recorders of both planes were analyzed in Canada but the cause of the collision has not yet been announced.
The temporary suspension of the flight controllers forced the Air Force and the National Agency of Civil Aviation led to personnel shortages and delays of up to seven hours in flights from the cities of Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Belo Horizonte and Brasilia.
According to the Estado news agency, small planes and executive jets could not take off, land or fly over those cities during peak traffic hours. The ban does not cover emergency medical flights or military or presidential flights, the agency said.
Air travel is expected to increase this week because of Brazil's Memorial Day holiday on Thursday.