Searchers find pieces of plane on ocean floor
Second flight recorder found
By Jeff Wilson, Associated Press, 02/03/00
PORT HUENEME, Calif. - Searchers found the intact tail of Alaska Airlines Flight 261 and recovered the flight data recorder Thursday, two pieces key to determining why the jetliner plummeted into the ocean.
The flight data recorder from Alaska Airlines Flight 261 sits on a table in front of NTSB Chairman Jim Hall during a press conference Tuesday. (AP photo)
|
Feb. 6
 Friends, relatives mourn 88 victims of Alaska Air crash
Feb. 3
Official: Cockpit tape shows crew struggling with mechanical problem
Feb. 2
One 'black box' flight recorder recovered
Feb. 1
Crash investigation focuses on jet's stabilizer
Experts say no common thread in in-flight crashes
Alaska employees choke back tears as they deal with loss
At airports, grief and relief follow news of crash
Jan. 31
Alaska Airlines jet crashes off California
In rising swells and spreading oil, boats search for plane, people
List of passengers and crew aboard Flight 261
Biographical sketches of several passengers
A look at McDonnell Douglas's MD-80 series
More from the Boeing Web site
Alaska Airlines Web site
Has its roots in a three-seat shuttle service begun in 1932 between Anchorage and Bristol Bay, Alaska. The service merged with Star Air Service in 1934 and, after several more mergers, adopted the name Alaska Airlines. With deregulation in 1979, Alaska began expanding throughout the West Coast and within a decade had tripled in size.
Alaska now carries more than 12 million customers per year, and its route system serves more than 40 cities in Alaska, Canada, Mexico and five Western states. Alaska says its fleet of 88 Boeing jets is the youngest among all major airlines.
Alaska planes are distinctive for the image of an Eskimo painted on their tails.
Source: Associated Press
Reconstruction of the crash of Flight 261
Following is summary of the last radio exchanges of Alaska Airlines Flight 261, as described by John Hammerschmidt of the National Transportation Safety Board. These are not direct quotes from pilots and controllers, but are based on what the NTSB called a rough transcript. Times are Pacific Standard.
3:55 p.m.
Last routine transmission before problems are reported. Los Angeles ATC (air traffic control center located in Palmdale, Calif.) clears Flight 261 to head for San Francisco at 31,000 feet.
4:10 p.m.
Flight 261 advises it is having control difficulties and descends to 26,000 feet.
Seconds later
Flight 261 reports it is at 23,700 feet. Discussion about pilots having trouble controlling the plane.
10 second later
ATC asks Flight 261 what altitude it wants to maintain.
4:11 p.m.
ATC asks Flight 261 its condition. Flight 261 advises it is "kind of stabilized," in Hammerschmidt's words, and is going to do some troubleshooting. Flight 261 asks for clearance to fly between 20,000 and 25,000 feet. ATC gives clearance.
4:14 p.m.
ATC asks if Flight 261 needs anything. Flight 261 responds that pilots are still working on the problem.
Seconds later
Discussion between air traffic controllers about handing off control of plane from one sector to the next.
4:15 p.m.
ATC traffic control hands off to a new controller who was aware of its problems.
Seconds later
Flight 261 advises it has a jammed stabilizer and difficulty maintaining altitude. Pilots think they can maintain altitude and land at Los Angeles International Airport.
4:16 p.m.
Flight 261 cleared to land at LAX. ATC asks if flight needs a lower altitude. Flight 261 says it needs to get to 10,000 feet and change configuration -- set the wing flaps to slow the plane down -- while over water. ATC issues clearance to 17,000 feet. Flight 261 says OK and advises it needs a block of altitudes. Last known transmission of Flight 261.
4:17 p.m.
ATC advises Flight 261 to contact another sector on a different frequency. Transmission not acknowledged.
4:21 p.m.
Flight 261 is lost off radar.
Source: Associated Press
|
|
|
|
Underwater robots exploring the ocean floor found where the wreckage came to rest after the MD-83 crashed Monday, killing all 88 aboard.
A submersible sent up video images of a piece of the fuselage with four windows, several large pieces up to six feet wide and numerous smaller pieces. The airline's logo - the smiling face of an Alaskan Eskimo - is clearly visible on the tail, said John Hammerschmidt, a member of the National Transportation Safety Board.
Hammerschmidt declined to say whether searchers had found any bodies, some of which are believed trapped under the debris.
Navy crews had earlier salvaged the cockpit voice recorder from about 640 feet of water. The flight data recorder recovered Thursday about 200 feet away would show the positions of the plane's controls and whether a problem with the horizontal stabilizer on the tail was merely a symptom of a larger failure that led to Monday's crash.
"That will tell the tale,'' said William Waldock, associate director for the Center for Aerospace Safety Education at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.
The discovery came as friends and relatives of the crash victims gathered along the beach facing the Santa Barbara Channel for a private memorial.
A few mourners roamed the shore alone, some clustered in small groups and others waded a few feet into the ocean. The group gathered inside the Point Mugu Naval Air Weapons Station, and reporters were kept out of the compound.
From the beginning the investigation has focused on the horizontal stabilizer because the pilots had reported problems with it. On Thursday, Hammerschmidt detailed interviews with Alaska mechanics, who described helping the pilots troubleshoot a "runaway stabilizer,'' which forced the plane's nose down.
At one point, the pilots asked if there were any hidden circuit breakers for the stabilizer's electrical controls. That suggests they already had shut off one set of circuit breakers - a standard remedy for a runaway stabilizer, also known as runaway trim.
Jammed or out-of-control horizontal stabilizers have led to at least a half dozen emergency landings but never a crash of a commercial airplane, federal records show.
A review of problems involving the device over the last 20 years show jamming is rare but has never driven a plane totally out of control.
An Associated Press examination of aviation records found that at least 20 in-flight problems with stabilizers were serious enough to be reported to the Federal Aviation Administration or the NTSB since 1979.
In two-thirds of those cases, the flights reached their intended destination. The rest made emergency landings, including an American Airlines MD-83, which returned to Phoenix minutes after taking off Tuesday.
More than a half dozen involved jets made by McDonnell Douglas, which also built the MD-83 that crashed off Southern California. Five of those cases involved planes with stabilizers mounted high on the tail, like the MD-83.
Trouble similar to what Flight 261 pilots reported never before led to a crash in the United States, according to experts and aviation reports.
The stabilizer, a wing on the tail of an aircraft, is designed to adjust - or trim - the up-or-down angle of an aircraft's nose.
"It's like the small corrections you make in the steering wheel going down the freeway. Unless you're really ham-fisted, people don't feel all those small corrections,'' said Capt. Steve Roach, a pilot union official who flew MD-83s for three years.
If the horizontal stabilizer starts moving on its own - a state of runaway trim - pilots can usually stop it by pulling circuit breakers and using other controls. In most cases, it will stop before reaching an extreme angle.
In most aircraft, including the MD-83, a jammed stabilizer can be overridden by moving elevators attached to its trailing edge and controlled by pulling forward or backward on the yoke in the cockpit.
If it jammed at an extreme position, the pilots must exert more pressure on the yoke but still should be able to maintain control.
"I have flown it in the simulator with the fully runaway trim, and that's quite a handful to fly,'' Roach said. "You're handflying it and having to maintain a considerable amount of pressure on the controls to keep the plane straight and level.''
Though stabilizer problems are rare, regulators last May gave airlines 18 months to inspect hinges connecting parts of the tail for signs of corrosion. An error during manufacture can cause the hinges to rust more easily.
The Alaska Airlines jet that crashed had not yet undergone the inspection, but 10 of the MD-80s in the fleet did and showed no unusual corrosion, said airline spokesman David Marriott. Records on other airlines' fleets were not immediately available.
