International Tapes loss hinders probe into tragic Chicago crash

Press, 28 May 1979, Page 8

International Tapes loss hinders probe into tragic Chicago crash

NZPA-Reuter Chicago Almost all cockpit conversations aboard the American Airlines jet that crashed on take-off at Chicago w ere wiped out by a power loss in a recorder, leaving only the word, “Dam n” on tape after the plane left the runway, a Federal official has said.

The death toll from America’s worst air disaster rose to 273 yesterday, after sheriff’s deputies reported that two persons who had been on the ground were among those killed.

One body was found in a truck, the second underneath a car across a road from the truck.

Federal investigators said it would probably be at least two months before the exact cause of the crash was known.

But Mr Flwood Driver, vice-chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, said in Chicago that a preliminary investigation indicated “there is no evidence of pilot error.”

Mr Driver also said that infants’ clothing had been found in the wreckage, leading investigators to believe the deathtoll might rise because Of the likelihood that infants were aboard However, Mr David Frailey, American Airways vicepresident for public relations, said in New York that he was not aware of anyinfants on the flight. An official for American

Airlines said the wide-bodied DCIO that crashed in a fiery ball had gone through a week-long “periodic” check in March at the airline’s facility in Tulsa. Oklahoma. The power loss had occurred in one of the jet’s two tape recorders, or black boxes, “a fraction of a second” after the nose wheel of the plane left the runway of Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, Mr Jim King, chairman of the Safety Board, said in Washington. The recorders, housed in the tail Section of the plane are built to withstand heat and impact.

Another board official said the flight date-recorder remained intact, and officials were getting valuable information from it, including the jet’s heading, airspeed, and altitude.

Mr King said the cockpit tape contained “the normal checklist process” from the time the plane began moving down the runway to when it began to lift off. After take-off, “We heard only one word and that word was ‘Damn!’ From

that point we don’t have any tape at all.” Mr King said the cause of the power loss was not known, but that it could have been a number of factors, including a possible circuit break or a break in a wire.

The two tapes were flown to Washington yesterday, federal officials immediately began examining them. Investigators were also analysing a ground-based air-traffic controller tape, which contains conversations between the pilots and the airport tower. Mr Warren Holtzberg. a Safety Board official in Chicago, said the tower tape showed that a controller at one point noted some problems with the plane and offered to clear a runway for it to land. But, Mr Holtzberg said, there was no response from the plane. All passengers, including many publishing officials on their way to a book-sales convention, were killed when the DC 10 bound for

Los Angeles lost one of its

three engines and crashed in a field about 45 seconds after take-off.

Two other persons on the ground were injured by burning debris One remained in a critical condition yesterday — the other was in good condition. Investigators said it was much too early to say why the engine fell off — er even that the engine loss caused the crash. The crash demolished the jetliner, leaving only a piece of landing gear standing in a field of smoldering rubble. Many bodies still were missing or unidentified yesterday.

Rescue workers fOund 258 bodies, placed them in plastic bags, and took them in police vans to a temporary morgue in an American airlines hanger. Mr Driver said the rest of the bodies were still buried in the debris.

Mr Driver said the plane, with a fuel capacity of about 140,000 gallons, (529,200 litres) was carrying ahout 78,000 gallons (294,840 ' litres) of fuel when it took off.