Call to ground all DCl0s; planes safe, says Air N.Z.

Press, 28 May 1979, Page 1

Call to ground all DCl0s; planes safe, says Air N.Z.

IXZPA Chicago Within 48 hours of the worst aviation crash in United States history at Chicago, controversy reopened yesterday over the safety of the DCIO aircraft, eight of which are owned by Air New Zealand, which still considers it one of the safest and most reliable aircraft in the world.

The American Airlines DCIO crashed on Saturday moments after losing one of its engines on take-off. The latest death toll is given as 273 — all 258 passengers and 13 crew, and two victims on the ground. Ralph Nader, the consumer advocate asked yesterday that all DC 10s be grounded until full results were in from the accident. He said that when an engine broke away on take-off it was reasonable t< imagine construction faults on other DCIO aircraft. Investigators are making a second-by-second study of the record of the accident. The first reports indicated no pilot error. The Airline Passengers’ Association has called for a check of DC 10s for metal fatigue on the engine mounts, but said it did not agree with Mr Nader’s suggestion to ground the aircraft. The association, which says it speaks for consumers and has more than 50,000 members, said “No positive reason for the engine to have separated itself from the wing ...

has as yet been determined.”

The association’s director (Mr James Dunne), sent a telegram to the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board, calling for a general check of all DClOs and a complete breakdown of a single aircraft about the same age as the one that crashed. His telegram said: “Grounding of the entire DCIO fleet would be a disservice to the flying public.” The association said that more than 300 DC 10s were in use throughout the world. The deputy chief executive of Air New Zealand (Mr J. B. Wisdom) said the airline would be given reports from American Civil Aviation authorities and from the aircraft manufacturer, McDonnellDouglas, on the causes of the crash. If these reports showed the need for any additional safety precautions, they would receive immediate attention, he said. Air New Zealand had eight' DClOs, Mr Wisdom said, all of which were given regular exhaustive

tests to guard against possible s’ructural failure. Mr Elwood Driver, the vice-chairman of the United States National Transportation Safety Board, said that about 10 seconds elapsed between the time the port engine came off and the crash. Mr Langhorne Bond, of Federal Aviation Administration, said the type of engines on the DCIO had been in use since 1970. The.e had been no indication of any irregularity. Another F.A.A. spokesman, (Mr N. Callahan) said, “It is incredible but not unheard of” for an engine to fall off. In April, 1977, an American Airline Boeing 707 lost its starboard inboard engine soon after take-off from Lambert Airport in St Louis. The aircraft circled for two hours, burning off fuel, and then landed safely. Mr Callahan said that a DCIO should be able to fly with one engine missing, but the aircraft’s low altitude — never higher than 500 ft — might have prevented the pilot from bringing it under control. (Tape loss will delay crash probe, Page 8.)