The loss of Air France Flight AF447 was the worst disaster in the company’s history – Copyright AFP Ilia YEFIMOVICH<\/p>\n
Alexandre Marchand<\/p>\n
Paris\u2019 appeals court Thursday found Air France and Airbus guilty of involuntary manslaughter over the 2009 crash of a Rio-Paris flight that killed 228 people, the worst disaster in France\u2019s aviation history.<\/p>\n
The Paris Court of Appeal ruled that the French flag carrier and Europe\u2019s leading aerospace manufacturer were \u201csolely and entirely responsible for the crash of flight AF447,\u201d ordering each to pay 225,000 euros ($261,000) \u2014 the maximum fine for corporate manslaughter.<\/p>\n
While the penalties are symbolic, the ruling will be seen as significant reputational damage for both companies.<\/p>\n
On June 1, 2009, Air France Flight AF447, travelling from Rio de Janeiro to Paris, was cruising over the Atlantic when the pilots lost control of the aircraft, causing it to plunge into the ocean.<\/p>\n
There were no survivors among the 216 passengers and 12 crew on board the Airbus-built A330 aircraft, the dead including 72 French nationals and 58 Brazilians.<\/p>\n
The companies, who have denied any criminal liability, blaming pilot error, had been acquitted by a lower court in 2023.<\/p>\n
That verdict was a blow to the victims\u2019 families, who said they were outraged by the court\u2019s decision to clear the companies of the charges.<\/p>\n
Although prosecutors at the time had asked for the charges to be dropped, they had subsequently lodged the appeal to allow \u201cthe full potential of the legal appeals procedure\u201d to play out.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The eight-week appeal trial ran between September and December last year.<\/p>\n
\u2013 \u2018Indecency\u2019 \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
In November, prosecutor Rodolphe Juy-Birmann lambasted the behaviour of Air France and Airbus over the years.<\/p>\n
\u201cNothing has come of it \u2014 not a single word of sincere comfort,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a rock-solid defence. One word sums up this whole circus: indecency.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lawyers for the families have argued that both companies were aware of the problem with pitot tubes, which are used to measure flight speed, and that the pilots were not trained to deal with such a high-altitude emergency.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The court heard how a malfunction with the tubes, which became blocked with ice crystals during a mid-Atlantic storm, caused alarms to sound in the plane\u2019s cockpit and the autopilot system to switch off.<\/p>\n
Experts highlighted how, after the instrument failed, the pilots put the plane into a climb that caused the aircraft to stall and then crash into the ocean.<\/p>\n
The companies were found guilty on all counts.<\/p>\n
The court criticised Airbus for underestimating the seriousness of problems with sensors and failing to properly inform the crews of operating airlines.<\/p>\n
Air France was found guilty of failing to provide pilot training tailored to situations involving icing of pitot tubes and to adequately inform flight crews.<\/p>\n
In October, Christophe Cail, who represented Airbus, said in court the company\u2019s goal was \u201czero accidents\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cEven the smallest accident is a failure for our entire community,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Pascal Weil, who represented Air France, said at the time that the company \u201chad the means to conduct high-altitude training, but we did not do so because we sincerely believed it was unnecessary\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The loss of Air France Flight AF447 was the worst disaster in the company’s history – Copyright AFP…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14845,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60],"tags":[2359,90,1699,383,701,735],"class_list":["post-14844","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-airbus","tag-accident","tag-airbus","tag-aviation","tag-brazil","tag-france","tag-trial"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14844","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14844"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14844\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14845"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14844"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14844"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/netherlands\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14844"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}