From a company memo posted on
Aero News :
The purpose of this communication is not to speculate as to what happened or cause greater concern. Rather, when a situation like this occurs, the best recovery for us as a company is to be out in front of the issue with our customers. Our customers will likely see news coverage of this incident and may have questions for customer contact employees. Answering those questions as professionally as possible is key and those efforts are appreciated. The facts as we know them at this time are:
The aircraft sustained a lightening strike the night before (Tuesday evening, Dec. 31, 2002) inbound to Tampa.
The aircraft underwent two lightening strike inspections in Tampa, and was approved for flight and signed off.
Upon arrival in Denver, additional inspections were performed, and all of the mechanics involved in that inspection, with the exception of one, approved the aircraft for flight.
The pilot in command also approved the aircraft for flight.
The employee who claims to have had additional doubt about the aircraft inspection process did not utilize proper channels to voice those doubts or document those concerns. Instead, he apparently took very extreme steps that caused damage to the aircraft.
Safety is paramount to everything we do at Frontier, and there is no doubt among any of the other employees involved in this incident that the aircraft was in any way unsafe for flight...
(I think they mean the opposite - PT)
You may confirm that Frontier is working with the appropriate authorities, including the Federal Bureau of Investigations and the Federal Aviation Administration to investigate the incident, and those organizations will be releasing any pertinent information about the incident, as they deem appropriate.