US: The co-pilot of an EgyptAir Flight crashed the airliner off the US Atlantic coast after repeatedly stating "I rely on God", a US government report said yesterday.
All 217 people on board died as a result of the crash of the Cairo-bound jet some 100 km south of Nantucket Island off the coast of Massachusetts in October 1999.
The report by the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said the EgyptAir Flight 1990 crash "was a result of the relief first officer's flight control inputs". But it said the reason for his action "was not determined".
The Egyptian government challenged the report and said it would formally appeal its conclusions. The Egyptian Civil Aviation Authority said further investigation was needed since US officials failed to consider evidence supporting multiple failures in the elevator control system, which controls the up and down movement of the aircraft's nose.
The NTSB stopped short of endorsing the theory that the co-pilot, Gamil El-Batouty, deliberately crashed the Boeing 767 after taking off from New York's John F. Kennedy Airport, and left open the possibility that he had tried to evade some type of danger.
"The Safety Board considered possible reasons for the relief first officer's actions; however, the Board did not reach a conclusion regarding the intent of or motivation for his actions," the report concluded. But, it said, "the investigation did not reveal any evidence" of mechanical failure that might have led to the disaster.
Egyptian officials had vigorously disputed suggestions that the crash was an intentional act of the co-pilot, and had promised they would file an objection to such a conclusion.
"The facts do not support the initial, and widely reported, theory that the (relief) first officer deliberately dove (sic) the plane toward the ocean," EgyptAir had claimed.
At the time of the crash, the Cairo-bound plane was controlled by the co-pilot who, according to on-board recording devices, uttered something resembling a prayer before sending the airliner toward the ocean.That led to speculation that Batouty could have been on a suicide mission and had crashed the plane intentionally.
When the captain returned to the cockpit shortly after the dive began and asked what was happening, Batouty replied in Arabic, "I rely on God" a phrase he repeated several times.
The report said the pilot tried to bring the plane out of the tailspin but the co-pilot did not help.
- (AFP, Reuters)