That Reuters article is appaling, and I'm sad to see the BBC has picked up the same nonsense.
prosecutors also said the pilot succumbed to panic, praying out loud instead of following emergency procedures and then opting to crash-land the plane instead trying to reach a nearby airport.
The problem with that statement is that there are a great many of us who
know, for a fact, that if Reuters' version of the prosecutor's claim is true (important caveat!), then the prosecutors are lying. The last five minutes of CVR recording (the actual recording, not the transcript) was leaked and was available on the web for a brief while. Lots of people had time to listen to it. As unacceptable as that is, at least it allows us to see right through the prosecution's "case".
From listening to the recording, you can tell a great many things, for instance:
- There was no "praying out loud". That is a downright lie. There are some low whispers, the last few seconds before the ditching, that might be prayers (I don't speak Arabic so I can't tell). But the crew was still flying at the time.
- There is absolutely nothing on the CVR that even with the most absurd degree of imagination could be indicative of "panic".
- The flight crew warned the cabin three times in the last few minutes before the crash, in French and in English ("brace for impact"). The cabin crew, and at least some of the passengers, would have understood the calls.
- The crew worked together very efficiently throughout the event. The captain handled flying and communication, the first officer handled checklists. In particular, it was a pleasant change to actually hear a ditching or forced landing checklist being actioned. That is quite rare; crews faced with an off-airport landing usually get stuck in the first emergency checklist they action, and never progress to the relevant forced landing checklist. This first officer started actioning the ditching checklist on his own initiative as soon as the captain informed ATC they would be ditching. That included taking the relevant actions, and reading out loud the advice on attitude etc from the checklist to the captain.
This conviction is an absolute disgrace.
