WaPo drops the ball on the real question in Airbus crash

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October 27, 2004

Responding to a Washington Post piece today on the National Transportation Safety Board's findings on the Airbus crash in 2001 that killed 260 people, Marcus Corbin of the Center for Defense Information writes:

Has the NTSB been captured by industry? It seems to me that they're following the classic whitewash approach of blaming the (dead) human pilot rather than holding the corporation (Airbus) accountable. Surely the bottom line should be that an aircraft's hardware and especially, nowadays, software should be designed so that the pilot CANNOT BREAK THE PLANE in normal flight. The Washington Post story on the verdict today didn't focus on this fundamental issue. Is there anybody out there who can shed light on whether this is a basic rule for aircraft design now, whether it should be if it's not, and whether it is not fundamentally wrong for a rudder to be breaking off at all, let alone because of the pilot's actions?

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