We know a little more about the conditions of the accident of the Boeing 737 Max, which crashed on march 10 in Ethiopia, six minutes after its takeoff. According to the preliminary report released Thursday, the pilots of flight 302 Ethiopian Airlines have complied with the emergency procedures to try to keep control of the plane. But to no avail. “The crew conducted several times, all the emergency procedures recommended by the manufacturer, but they have not been able to regain control of the aircraft,” said Thursday the minister of ethiopian Transport, Dagmawit Moges, during a press conference. Ethiopian Airlines, for its part, considers that his crew followed all the instructions to deal with “an emergency situation” difficult. Boeing has indicated that it would “study” the report.
in Accordance with the rules of international airlines, the preliminary report does not appoint a responsible for this accident. It does not provide more detailed analysis of the volume of The ministry of transport of ethiopia has indicated that it would still take between 6 months and a year of investigation prior to submission of the final report. However, the draft document suggests that Boeing should review its flight control system and that the agencies of the aviation safety confirm that the issue has been resolved prior to re-authorize this type of aircraft to fly.
Boeing: the staff of Ethiopian Airlines has “all the procedures” – to Look on Figaro Live
Since the crash of the Ethiopian Airlines, which has made 157 dead, the fleet of Boeing 737 Max is pinned down in the world. This disaster occurred five months after that of another aircraft of the same model of the company’s indonesian Lion Air, which crashed on 29 October, also a few minutes after its take-off, with 189 people on board.
Not to mention the anti-stall “MCAS”
however, the document does not explicitly mention the anti-stall “MCAS” (“Manoeuvring Characteristics Increase System”) as a possible cause of the accident, suspected, however, have accentuated the fall of the aircraft of Ethiopian but also that of the device of Lion Air. This device, designed specifically for the 737 MAX in order to correct a defect of aerodynamics related to power most heavy, is designed to tilt automatically the nose of the aircraft to maintain the effect of ascension. It measures the angle of attack with the help of a probe (AOA) and to avoid a stall of the device, puts the plane in “dive” (nose down to the ground).
In an instruction addressed to the crew on the 6th of last November, Boeing explained that an error of the probe could lead to the MCAS to put it brutally the aircraft in “sharpness”. To remedy this, the manufacturer recommended that drivers turn off the system by “disconnecting the countervailing power”, and “until the end of the flight”.
However, after the Wall Street Journal , citing people who have had access to the data of the black boxes of the plane, the captain and his co-pilot, facing a failure of the MCAS have met “initially” to the urgency procedure established by the manufacturer. But according to the daily, the crew would have, however, reactivated the system. The way in which the system could be reactivated is not established for the time being, and the latter was able to reactivate all alone, indicated at l ’AFP a source close to the investigation.
