Greece crash plane may already have been flying tomb
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By Brian Williams
ATHENS (Reuters) - A Cypriot airliner that crashed in Greece may already have been a flying tomb when it plunged to earth with some of the 121 people aboard already either dead or unconscious, early indications suggest.
Sunday's crash, the worst air disaster in Greece and the worst involving a Cypriot airline, perplexed aviation experts astounded by what appeared to have been a catastrophic failure of cabin pressure and or oxygen supply at 35,000 feet -- nearly 10 kilometers (six miles) up, higher than Mount Everest.
There was also mystery over the last minutes of the Helios Airlines Boeing 737 flight which was declared "renegade" when it entered Greek air space and failed to make radio contact, causing two F-16 air force jets to scramble to investigate.
All 115 passengers and six crew died, most burned beyond visual recognition, when the plane, with neither pilot in control, spiraled down in a death dive into a mountainous area about 40 km north of Athens.
The plane was on a flight from Larnaca in Cyprus to Prague with a stop in Athens. An airline spokeswoman and Greek authorities denied some media reports that many of those on board were children.
Airport officials in Cyprus said flight HCY522 left Larnaca at 9 a.m. (0700 GMT) on Sunday and lost contact at 10:30 a.m.
Greek Defense Ministry officials said 90 minutes elapsed between the alert first being raised at 10:30 a.m. and the plane crashing at 12:03 p.m.
Greek government spokesman Theodore Roussopoulos said the F-16 pilots sent to investigate reported that with the pilots out of action there may have been a last-gasp effort by others on the plane to bring it back under control.
"The situation was characterized renegade, meaning the aircraft was not under the control of the pilots," Roussopoulos told reporters, explaining how the crisis unfolded after the plane failed to make radio contact.
"At a later stage, the F-16s saw two individuals in the cockpit seemingly trying to regain control of the airplane," Roussoupoulos said.
"The F-16s also saw oxygen masks down when they got close to the aircraft. The aircraft was making continuous right-hand turns to show it had lost radio contact."
A passenger on the doomed plane said in an SMS text to his cousin in Athens: "The pilot has turned blue. Cousin farewell, we're freezing."
CHARRED BODIES
Reuters photographer Yannis Behrakis reported from the crash site that dozens of bodies were still strapped into their seats, some with the remnants of oxygen masks over their faces.
"Two charred bodies were still hugging each other," he said.
The plane broke into many pieces on impact, with the two engines 500 meters away from each other, the cockpit a further 200 metros away and the tail broken off a further distance away.
Greece's defense ministry said it suspected the plane's oxygen supply or pressurization system may have malfunctioned.
Loss of cabin pressure was identified as the probable cause of two similar but smaller-scale air crashes in recent years.
Pro-golfer Payne Stewart and five others were killed when their Learjet aircraft crashed in the United States in 1999 after flying for more than four hours without radio contact.
In 2000 a plane crashed in Australia after flying for more than an hour from 25,000 feet up with no sign of life on board.
Experts told Reuters it was extremely rare for a plane to lose oxygen, and that emergency systems should have kicked in.
"The pilots should have had their masks on," a retired British pilot who did not wish to be named told Reuters. "Why they didn't put them on is the big mystery."
"A loss of pressurization in the cabin is in itself a rare event but to go as far as it incapacitates the pilot is hugely rare," the retired pilot said.
Greek media speculated a toxic gas from possible faulty air-conditioning could have incapacitated the two pilots before they knew they were in danger.
One of the F-16 pilots said he could not see the captain in the cockpit and his co-pilot appeared to be slumped in his seat.
A spokesman for the European Aviation Safety Agency, Daniel Holtgen, based in Cologne, Germany, said the cause of the crash was likely to be a combination of factors:
"It is highly unlikely that the loss of cabin pressure alone would cause such an incident. There would have to be other contributing factors."
© Reuters 2005. All Rights Reserved. -
weird... sounds like something out of the bermuda triangle. scary...
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could be something inside blew up and killed the pilots.. and most of the pax...
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maybe... but it doesn't tie in with wot the F-16 pilots saw.Originally posted by the Bear:could be something inside blew up and killed the pilots.. and most of the pax... -
leave it up to the boffins to figure things out...
things blow up in planes too.. -
You know what is cover up?Tell story A to the government and story B to the press.Originally posted by HENG@:maybe... but it doesn't tie in with wot the F-16 pilots saw.
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hmm. still, the bodies frozen solid? that bit really sounds freaky.Originally posted by the Bear:leave it up to the boffins to figure things out...
things blow up in planes too.. -
All i know is that 2 greek fighter jets intercepted another airliner just a few days before
www.f-16.net -
wow! tts news!!!!!Originally posted by SMAPLionHeart:All i know is that 2 greek fighter jets intercepted another airliner just a few days before
www.f-16.net -
of courseOriginally posted by FireIce:wow! tts news!!!!! -
think must be the air crew never close the air plane doors properly, thereby allowing air to flow out to the atmosphere, and hence, sooner or later oxygen is depleted!
must be either the door, one of the windows, or external pipings or connections losing oxygen to the atmosphere....
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where got so simple one... structural failure along any of the seams or rivets or any area of weakness, is enuf to cause that le. not just door or window...Originally posted by nightzip:think must be the air crew never close the air plane doors properly, thereby allowing air to flow out to the atmosphere, and hence, sooner or later oxygen is depleted!
must be either the door, one of the windows, or external pipings or connections losing oxygen to the atmosphere.... -
hmm...i think that yeah, possible structural failure. possibly with the decompression systems. planes are easy to destroy in the air with explosives precisely because of its decompression systems. 15g of high explosives to rip a sizeable hole in the airframe and the plane rips itself apart but in this case, a full failure would lead to people on board experiencing the harsh elements outside...really just have to wait for the report...everything is just pure speculation now...
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Air at very high altitudes has very low temperatures.Originally posted by HENG@:A passenger on the doomed plane said in an SMS text to his cousin in Athens: "The pilot has turned blue. Cousin farewell, we're freezing."
I've seen it, for myself, icy particles and snowflakes formed on outside the glass window plane.
I conclude, there's a leak somewhere in the plane that allowed the icy cold air from outside to leak in. -
my exact sentiments, i.e. air is leaking away, so the decompression system tried and tried in vain to decompress the cabin, until over-heat or something or until oxygen runs out.
take note that most prob. no catastrophic failure has occurred, maybe some seams etc...which does not cause plane to exploded etc before diving to the sea. -
oh yah
heard on radio apparently the SMS was a hoax. no one onboard sent that SMS
some dumb fark sent it. got arrested. he looks dead... -
The air conditioning system has subsequently failed thus allowing the temperature within to detioterate. One can safely assume most electrical systems on board had failed, including the one that is supposed to send in oxygen.
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www.aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=20050814-0
Note that this particular aircraft has had a history of pressurization problems.
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wah!Originally posted by HENG@:"Two charred bodies were still hugging each other," he said. -
reminds me of the scene in titantic, where the old couple hugged each other in bed, while the water rushes in...Originally posted by SMAPLionHeart:wah!
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It gives a new meaning to the marriage vow , "til death do us part"Originally posted by Mr Fugue:reminds me of the scene in titantic, where the old couple hugged each other in bed, while the water rushes in...