-Caveat Lector-
Many questions raised by Egyptair Flight 990 crash
By Martin McLaughlin
2 November 1999
Use this version to print
http://www.wsws.org/articles/1999/nov1999/crsh-n02.shtml
The crash of an Egyptair passenger jet early Sunday morning, apparently
killing all 217 people on board, raises troubling issues, both in relation
to the safety of airplane manufacturing and airline operations, and to the
possibility of a cover-up of aspects of the disaster by the US and Egyptian
governments.
The crash of Egyptair Flight 990 was the third such tragedy in three years
for a passenger jet taking off from John F. Kennedy Airport in New York City
for a transatlantic flight. It follows the June 1996 explosion which
destroyed TWA Flight 800, in which 230 died, and Swissair Flight 111, which
crashed into the Atlantic in September 1998, while trying to make an
emergency landing in Halifax, Nova Scotia, killing 229 people.
All three jets were built by Boeing, although they were different models.
TWA Flight 800 was a Boeing 747 and the Swissair jet was an MD-11, built by
McDonnell-Douglas before it was taken over by Boeing. The Egyptair jet was a
Boeing 767.
While more than 1,000 flights a day originate at Kennedy, many of them
taking the transatlantic route, the loss of three flights in three years
with a combined death toll of 676 inevitably suggests that there are
unexamined problems with airline operations there. No other airport in the
world has had such a series of disasters.
While in most air crashes there is some indication beforehand of mechanical
difficulty or human error, suggesting a probable cause, both the TWA and
Egyptair flights crashed suddenly in nearly the same location, without any
communication from the pilots indicating anything was amiss. The TWA flight
exploded in mid-air. The Egyptair flight apparently did not explode, but
went into a sudden and catastrophic dive. During the 36 seconds in which the
plane plunged 20,000 feet, the pilots said nothing to ground control.
While the American media has been relatively restrained about the
disaster-taking its cue from the Clinton administration and the FBI-the
Egyptian and European press carried numerous reports suggesting possible
causes for the crash.
Egyptian press suggested peculiar weather conditions in the region, noting
that the Egyptair jet crashed very close to the site of the crashes of TWA
Flight 800 and the private plane piloted by John F. Kennedy Jr. Egyptian
President Hosni Mubarak, a close ally of the US government, said that the
two accidents in the same area make him question whether or not the air
routes should be changed.
"There may be something in the atmosphere or weather conditions may be
sometimes very tough there," he said. "So I think it should be investigated
by the United States and if it is needed to change the routes, the airways,
depending on the discussions and the assessment of the situation in this
part of the world."
The editor-in-chief of Al-Gomhuriya newspaper, Samir Ragab, a confidant of
Mubarak, wrote that Washington should investigate suggestions that a US
missile test may have caused the TWA disaster. The US authorities should
"wake up and reveal the secret of these two disasters which happened in the
same place," he said. "There have been persistent reports that the TWA plane
exploded because of a missile mistakenly fired from a land base."
Reuters news agency reported that 30 Egyptian military officers who had been
receiving training in the United States were on board the flight, including
several as high-ranking as brigadier general. Several were pilots training
on US-supplied Apache attack helicopters. The Egyptian government has
forbidden the country's newspapers to report the presence of the officers on
the doomed plane, suggesting that it has something to hide.
Reuters added, citing "aviation sources," that three of the Egyptian
officers had not been checked in on the passenger manifest. This explains
the discrepancy in the number of victims, which press reports have given
variously as 214 and 217. Television reports Sunday morning, later denied by
US officials, said that the Egyptair flight, which began in Los Angeles, had
made an unscheduled stop at Edwards Air Force Base, in the Mojave Desert
outside the city, before proceeding on to New York.
This report, and the Egyptian censorship, raises a number of
possibilities-that the plane was targeted for attack because of the large
number of military officers on board, or that military equipment or supplies
may have been brought on board with them and played a role in the disaster.
The 767 jet had stopped at Cairo, Newark, Los Angeles and Kennedy Airport
during the 48 hours prior to its destruction.
Another curious aspect of the tragedy is that the 767 which crashed Sunday
came off the assembly line at the Everett, Washington plant in the fall of
1989 just before another 767, built for the Austrian airline Lauda, which
crashed in 1991 in Thailand. The Lauda jet plummeted to earth
catastrophically when its reverse thrusters, used to slow the plane for
landing, suddenly and unexpectedly became activated. Some 223 people died in
that crash. The two jets are the only 767s to suffer catastrophic mechanical
failure, out of more than 750 in service.
The Everett plant was working such heavy overtime during 1989 that it
produced widespread complaints from rank-and-file machinists, ultimately
sparking a 48-day strike which began October 4, 1989. The Egyptair jet was
delivered September 26, 1989, the 282nd to be built, and the Lauda jet
followed on October 16, 1989, the 283rd, with work completed by nonunion
personnel after the strike began.
Bill Johnson, president of the International Association of Machinists and
Aerospace Workers local at the Everett plant, defended the company against
the suggestion that heavy overtime had contributed to the disasters. He said
it was ''highly improbable'' that stress on workers had led to faulty
construction. "You can be assured that when that plane goes out the door it
is of the utmost quality that the flying public expects,'' Johnson told the
press.
In a grisly irony, the Egyptair tragedy came less than two days after it was
revealed that Boeing had concealed from NTSB officials investigating the TWA
Flight 800 crash a report which shows that the aircraft manufacturer was
well aware of the dangers of a fuel tank explosion in its 747 jets.
NTSB officials revealed October 29 that Boeing had failed to turn over a
four-volume report on the dangers of fuel-tank vapors exploding in the
military equivalent of the 747, the E-4B. They said that if the report,
drafted in 1980, had been provided to them, the information would have
directed them immediately to the center fuel tank as the likely cause of the
explosion.
As it was, NTSB and FBI investigators clashed repeatedly over 16 months,
with the FBI insisting that the explosion was the result of terrorism,
before the preliminary conclusion was drawn that a fuel tank explosion was
the likely cause. Federal officials learned of the report's existence in
March 1999, and the four volumes were not turned over to the NTSB until
June.
In the TWA investigation, Boeing officials sided with the FBI suspicions of
sabotage, saying that there was no way that the central fuel tank could get
hot enough to create the conditions for an explosion. But the 1980 report
focused on the danger that excess heat from air conditioners located next to
the center fuel tank could create highly flammable fuel vapors inside it.
The company recommended that the Air Force add insulation between the air
conditioning bay and the fuel tank, the same recommendation made by the
NTSB-19 years later!-as part of its investigation into the TWA disaster.
Senator Charles Grassley, a conservative Republican from Iowa who heads the
subcommittee reviewing the TWA investigation, said the report should had
been released in 1990, after a Philippines Airline Boeing 737 suffered a
fuel-tank explosion in Manila. If Boeing had done so, he said, the Flight
800 tragedy could have been averted. "If the NTSB had been given the 1980
report and others, it could have pressed the FAA to set the very standards
finally proposed this week for airplane fuel tanks."
DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER
==========
CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic
screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soapboxing! These are sordid matters
and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright
frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects
spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL
gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers;
be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credeence to Holocaust denial and
nazi's need not apply.
Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
========================================================================
Archives Available at:
http://home.ease.lsoft.com/archives/CTRL.html
http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
========================================================================
To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Om
