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GF 072 GDN Report

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Old 16th Jun 2002, 09:50
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New suit is planned in crash case


By RICHARD MOORE


LAWYERS for Gulf Air crash victims' families will file litigation next month in France against the airline and the aircraft manufacturer.

French attorney R Martin-Chico and his associate, aviation attorney specialist Carlos Villacorta Salis, from Madrid, will file a class action suit on July 11 in France's Civil Affairs Court in Bordeaux.

They are filing on behalf of the families of 35 of the 36 Bahrainis who died in the crash, just off Muharraq, on August 23, 2000.

The case is being brought against both Gulf Air and Toulouse-based Airbus Industrie, alleging pilot error and that there were design flaws in the tail section of the Airbus A320.

The action comes nearly two years after Gulf Air Flight 072, en route from Cairo, ploughed into the sea just off the coast of Muharraq, killing all 135 passengers and eight crew members.

Captain Ihsan Shakeeb had aborted two landing attempts and was on his second "go around" when the plane went down less than two kilometres from the runway.

Civil Aviation Affairs (CAA) still has not released the final report on the crash, which the Flight 072 Family Committee, set up to represent victims' families, claims was completed last December.

A CAA official yesterday would neither confirm or deny the committee's claim, adding that he did not know when the final report would be released.

Committee board members returned last week from France, where they held lengthy discussions with their attorneys on the forthcoming lawsuit.

They denied reports in other newspapers last week that they are seeking $40 million (BD15.12m) in punitive damages.

"We have not set any amount," explained committee board member and Bahraini businessman Kamal Shehabi, who lost a brother in the crash.

"We haven't even received the final report, how can we know the amount we will ask?"

But Mr Shehabi did confirm that the committee unanimously decided some time ago to seek more than the $125,000 per victim offer submitted by Gulf Air insurance liability attorneys, in accordance with the financial limits set by the Montreal Treaty.

The litigation comes nine months after Mr Martin-Chico signed an agreement with the committee to present their case in the French courts.

He said earlier that the factual report on the crash, which was released on April 1, 2001, did not satisfactorily address several serious issues, which was why he was brought on board.

"The 90-page report contained all aspects of the investigation, but it drew no conclusions," he explained.

"It also did not find any fault with the aircraft."

The report was submitted in December 2000, to National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) assistant deputy director Frank Hilldrup, who headed the investigation.

It included the board's Technical Investigation Committee's cockpit voice recorder/flight data recorder, air worthiness and operations sub-group findings.

The report was compiled by more than 25 sub-group committees representing the NTSB, CAA, Gulf Air, Oman Civil Aviation, Airbus Industrie, Bureau Enquetes-Accidents, and CFMI (the engine manufacturer).

Mr Martin-Chico acknowledged the factual report stated there were no anomalies with the aircraft and denied that he was challenging it.

"The report offers no negative evidence and does not confirm or deny human or technical fault," he explained.

Mr Martin-Chico said the black box tapes showed the aircraft was nose up by two degrees and that the aircraft stabiliser was nose down by around two degrees, when they both should have been in the same direction.

"What we need to know is why. Was it indeed human error, or did the equipment not respond to the pilot's command in time to save the plane," he reiterated yesterday.

Mr Martin-Chico said he and his staff had consulted Gulf Air's airline and insurance brokerage attorneys and Airbus Industrie lawyers and that an out-of-court settlement had been discussed.

"However, it doesn't appear we will be able to reach a satisfactory financial compromise without taking it to court," he added.

In addition to Mr Shehabi, other men who comprise the Flight 072 Family Committee board are attorney Hassan Bedaiwi, who lost his brother; Al Nawras Travel owner Mohammed Hamada, who lost a brother, sister and brother-in-law and niece; attorney Isa Ajlan, who lost his brother; and attorney Ali Oraibi, who lost his cousin.

The committee was formed shortly after the disaster in an attempt to strengthen the position of the more than 100 immediate family members of local victims, primarily spouses and children.

In addition to the Bahraini victims, crash casualties included nationals from the US, UK, Canada, Australia, Egypt, Poland, Morocco, the Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Oman, the UAE, Kuwait, and Sudan.
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Old 16th Jun 2002, 11:44
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Sounds to me like a bigpile of rubbish!

My condolences go out to all those who have lost family/friends in this tragical accident but this law suit will not change a thing, especially the part against airbus industries!

"Mr Martin-Chico said the black box tapes showed the aircraft was nose up by two degrees and that the aircraft stabiliser was nose down by around two degrees, when they both should have been in the same direction"

This not true at all, both have nothing to do wich each other and certainly are no solid grounds to build a case! There is an elevator as well you know, there is the loading of the aircraft as well, there is airspeed as well......etc!

Sounds like a very weak case to me.....
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Old 16th Jun 2002, 14:17
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The GF072 report was due to be published a couple of weeks ago. Gulf Air was all set even down to the crisis team being assembled and in position ready to deal with the press etc.
Then at the last minute an order came from the King to stop the publication. Now I do not know why he decided to stop it now but it is gonna have to be published sometime. When the accident happened he said that there would be a full open report on it.
No surprise of course that the report blames the pilot for the crash but the problem Gulf Air has is the practices and procedures it had in place which allowed someone to be made a Captain who had no right to be. Sam was actually on a list made up by a senior training captain of all the Captains who were very dangerous and incompetent, but the powers at be at that time chose to ignore these warnings as these guys were A) Locals and B) Friends or Family.

Nasty Business
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Old 16th Jun 2002, 14:49
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sirwa69:
You mentioned the report was stopped at a very high political level, but will have to be published sometime. No it doesn't; what I've seen of these Middle Eastern countries is that; once hi-level interest in a cover-up is expressed, you may NEVER see a report. Remember Saudia's HK in Riyadh in '81...we're still waiting.
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Old 13th Jul 2002, 19:14
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Gulf Air Accident Report

The rumour mill says that the GF 072 report is to be submitted to Gulf Air today. Is there any news about what the report contains or when it will be made public?
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Old 14th Jul 2002, 04:47
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I aggree with Airbusser, seems their expert is not very expert and is more than likely getting elevator and stabiliser mixed up.

I don't think Airbus has too much to be concerned about, on the other hand Gulf Air has a problem. A number of areas will come under close scrutiny - particularly the command selection process, training and checking. At the time GF operating procedures were significantly different to the manufacturers recommended procedures. This will come under very close scrutiny.

have a nice day
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Old 14th Jul 2002, 06:38
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According to the Gulf Daily News the report was submitted to Gulf Air management yesterday and will be released TODAY

Watch this space, but don't hold your breath
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Old 14th Jul 2002, 08:28
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Suuurre..it will...just read it my self in the GDN....therefore it MUST be true
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Old 14th Jul 2002, 17:38
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It is 20:40 Bahrain time. I have not heard anything as of yet. Does anyone have any updates? Or is this another joke from the GDN?
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Old 15th Jul 2002, 11:36
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Final Report finally out
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Old 15th Jul 2002, 15:13
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Downloaded it, read it, no surprises...CFIT.....
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Old 15th Jul 2002, 16:00
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Downloaded it, read it, no surprises...CFIT.....
Indeed. But as far as I can tell this reports highlits extremely poor airmanship. Amazing. If this is true this fellow had no business flying a passenger jet.

--alex
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Old 15th Jul 2002, 17:36
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Many of us, a long tme ago, realised that there was never going to be a (quote) "The Captain was responsible but the Airline was more responsible for having made him a Captain" response to the accident from anyone in authority in Bahrain.

To anyone with any sort of flying experience it was obvious what went wrong on that terrible evening.

All the evidence points to a situation where we have a man who has been given responsibility for the operation of a complex piece of machinery carrying a large number of souls WHO SHOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN GIVEN THAT RESPONSIBILITY IN THE FIRST PLACE!

For God's sake Gulf Air - come clean. Yes, we all know the way the Middle East works. If you know the right people you can talk yourself into just about any job - but that "old boy's network" should never ease someone into a job that carries real reponsibility for the lives of other people.

Gulf Air management take note, there is no point in pussyfooting around any longer. Admit your culpability, kick out the existing management and go on to recruit a body of people who can really help you to succeed before it is too late and the airline disappears into oblivion.
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Old 15th Jul 2002, 20:06
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Well!!! I have just finished reading it and I must say as far as the Captains actions it is in total accordance with the explanations given to me by various Gulf Air pilots over the last 18 months. No surprises there.
I now know why it took so long to publish, the critisisms of Gulf Air management are stinging to say the least and as someone who has flown 12 sectors with them in the last 7 days I can only welcome them.
Anybody who has connections to Gulf Air in Bahrain has known for a long time that the push to get locals in positions of authority (Captains, Managers VP's etc.) has been so great that competency is often overlooked. Hopefully this sad event will have changed that.
Xeque please note
Gulf Air has changed its management and is in the process of getting rid of the deadwood, unfortunately it has taken financial considerations to do this and not safety, but it is being addressed.
There is a saying going around the pink palace at the moment that all positions on the organisation chart marked TBA stands for "To Be Australian". In view of the fact that even the NTSB regards Australian pilots as the safest in the world then I for one am not going to complain. Reason, An Aussie takes no bul**** and doesn't give a stuff about local sensitivities, if he thinks there is a problem then he will take over and deal with it.
If the FO had been an Aussie this tragic event would not have happened mind you the prevailing management would probably have sacked him for taking control from one of their golden boy captains
I would like to wish the new management all the luck in the world and hope they can save Gulf Air, and if they do I hope that the owners learn from their past mistakes and do not place a non-competent local in to take over running the airline when it is back on a sound footing.
However we all know they will and it'll start all over again
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Old 15th Jul 2002, 21:05
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The Middle East and Far East have much in common with this situation. Silkair have, thus far, managed to ride out the waves of criticism for exactly the same problem!
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Old 16th Jul 2002, 00:53
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I still can't see where the lawsuit against Airbus as a manufacturer comes into play..

Would someone be kind enough to point it out to me..
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Old 16th Jul 2002, 01:50
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Brenoch:

Simple, really. It's either of two scenarios being played out:

1) The law firm handling the case is an ambulance chaser and simply out to make a buck - possibly seeking an out-of-court settlement by Airbus on the assumption that everyone's got some dirty linen they would rather hide.

2) The law firm is smart and by filing a law suit against Airbus will force that company to defend itself. If Airbus is blameless, it will have to defend itself by dragging up all the dirt at GF (which have been alluded to in this forum in the past).
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Old 16th Jul 2002, 05:06
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Eventually !!Probe Blames Captain for GF Jet Crash

Probe blames captain for Gulf Air jet crash
Manama |By Mohammed Almezel | 16-07-2002
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The failure of the captain and his crew to handle the critical last moments of the Gulf Air flight GF-072 was the most significant cause that led to the tragic crash of the aircraft two years ago just off the coast of Bahrain killing all 143 people on board, says an investigation report released yesterday by Bahrain's Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).

On 23 August 2000, at about 1930 local time, the Airbus A320-212, an Oman registered aircraft A40-EK which was operating a regular flight from Cairo International Airport to Bahrain, crashed at sea ? about five kilometres north-east of Bahrain International Airport resulting in the death of the two pilots, six cabin crew and the 135 passengers.

According to the report which took two years to be completed by the CAA, the other owner states of the airline and Airbus, the investigation showed that no single factor was responsible for the accident.

"The accident was the result of a fatal combination of many contributory factors, both at the individual and systemic levels," it noted.

The factors contributing to the accident were identified by the report as "a combination of individual and systemic issues. The individual factors during the approach and final phases of the flight were: non-adherence to standard operating procedures (SOPs) by the captain," 37-year-old Bahrain national Ihasn Shakeeb, who had been with Gulf Air since 1978.

SOPs not adhered

The captain, the report says, "did not adhere to a number of SOPs, particularly during the approach and final phases of flight:

- During the descent and the first approach, flight GF-072 had significantly higher speed than standard;
- During the first approach, standard 'approach configurations' were not achieved, and the approach was not stabilised on the correct approach path by 500 ft.;
- When the captain perceived that he was 'not going to make it' on the first approach, standard go-around and missed approach procedures were not initiated;
- Instead, the captain executed a 360-degree orbit, a non-standard manoeuvre close to the runway at low altitude, with a considerable variation in altitude, bank angle and 'g' force;
- A 'rotation to 15 degree pitch-up' was not carried out during the go-around after the orbit;
- Neither the captain nor the first officer responded to hard GPWS warnings;
- In the approach and final phases of flight, there were a number of deviations of the aircraft from the standard flight parameters.

Deviations

The report went on to say that during the approach and final phases of flight, "and in spite of a number of deviations from the standard flight parameters and profile, the first officer did not call them out, or draw the attention of the captain to them, as required by SOPs."

"During the go-around after the orbit, it appears that the flight crew experienced spatial disorientation," of which the report lists as an example the application by the pilot of a nose-down side-stick input that was held for about 11 seconds, resulting in a nose-down pitch of 15 degrees during the go-around when the aircraft was accelerating rapidly.

As for the first officer, the report says that he failed to draw the attention of the captain to the deviations of the aircraft from the standard flight parameters and profile.

Other individual factors contributed to the tragedy were the "information overload" experienced by the flight crew and the "non-effective response" by the flight crew to the ground proximity warnings, the report added.

As for what the investigators called "the systemic factors" that could have led to the individual factors, the report mentions "the lack of a crew resources management (CRM) training programme; inadequacy in some of the airline's A320 flight crew training programmes; problems in the airline's flight data analysis system and flight safety department which were not functioning satisfactorily and organisational and management issues within the airline.

The Gulf Air's Organisational Factors that contributed to the crash were listed as:

- Inadequacy in the company's A320 training programmes;
- At the time of the accident, Gulf Air's flight data analysis system was not functioning satisfactorily, and the flight safety department had a number of deficiencies, which restricted the airline's awareness in many critical safety areas.

"Any one of these systemic factors, by itself, was insufficient to cause a breakdown of the safety system. When these latent conditions, which may often remain undetected within a system for a considerable period of time, combine with local events and environmental circumstances, a system failure, such as an accident, may occur," the report noted. "All of these factors must be addressed to prevent such an accident happening again," the report urged.

According to the report, Gulf Air has taken a number of post-accident safety initiatives to address some of these individual and systemic factors. "The airline has reported that it is in the process of enhancing its flight crew training.

Commenting on the report, Gulf Air's president and chief executive James Hogan said that the airline is reviewing the findings, recommendations and the conclusions of the final report. However he added that passenger security and the safe operation of our aircraft "remain Gulf Air's two main priorities; that was the situation at the time of the accident and is the situation now."
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Old 16th Jul 2002, 06:52
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Brenoch/Alpha,

Or it maybe that the lawyers needed to involve a French party so that they could get the case in front of the French courts.

Given the report's findings, it'll be interesting to see what happens to the case in France - Airbus don't look to have too much difficulty in getting off the hook, and I wonder if the whole case will then be thrown out.
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