Following a formal investigation that has continued for nearly two years, a final report by a special task force under the Civil Aviation Administration has concluded that pilot error -- as has long been expected -- was behind the crash of China Airlines flight 676 at CKS International Airport in Taoyuan in February, 1998, that killed all 196 people on board and six others on the ground.
The investigation into the crash has centered around orders from the control tower to the plane to abort its first landing attempt, and to "go around" for a second landing.
The investigation found that the pilot had released the plane's autopilot but was not aware of it, and the procedures taken for the second landing attempt were erroneous.
The Civil Aeronautics Administration will submit the bilingual report, which runs up to several hundred pages, to the Ministry of Transportation and Communications. A formal announcement of its results will be made in about a month's time.
The reports says the plane's pilot failed to correct an error in the plane's altitude during the landing approach, despite warnings from the control tower that the aircraft was more than 1,000 meters above its normal altitude when it was only six nautical miles away from the airport.
The report also pointed out that before the plane hit the ground, it was locked in autopilot mode, but that when it started to dip, it was turned to manual control. The investigation group said these facts led them to conclude that as the Airbus A300 was preparing to land, the pilot mistakenly believed the aircraft was on autopilot.
When he received the order to "go around," he therefore did nothing to actively take control of the plane. For 11 seconds, the report says, the plane was under no one's control.
The report concludes by pointing the finger at China Airlines for what it calls "insufficient training" and "poor management of the resources in the pilot's cabin".
Flight 676 had been returning from the Indonesian resort of Bali, where, among other passengers, then-Central Bank governor Sheu Yuan-dong (
In the nearly two years since the crash, speculation has continued about the possible role of pilot error. As early as the day after the crash, airline industry analysts and other sources cast doubt on the possibility that it was caused by mechanical failure.
They cited the fact that there had been no obvious mechanical failure before impact, evident in the pattern of wreckage and the pilot's conversation with the flight control tower.
The plane plowed into a row of apartment buildings not too far from the runway, and then broke into several pieces. Experts have said that if the pilot had lost control, the aircraft would have crashed over a wider swath of land.
The US government has signed defense cooperation agreements with Japan and the Philippines to boost the deterrence capabilities of countries in the first island chain, a report by the National Security Bureau (NSB) showed. The main countries on the first island chain include the two nations and Taiwan. The bureau is to present the report at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee tomorrow. The US military has deployed Typhon missile systems to Japan’s Yamaguchi Prefecture and Zambales province in the Philippines during their joint military exercises. It has also installed NMESIS anti-ship systems in Japan’s Okinawa
‘WIN-WIN’: The Philippines, and central and eastern European countries are important potential drone cooperation partners, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung said Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) in an interview published yesterday confirmed that there are joint ventures between Taiwan and Poland in the drone industry. Lin made the remark in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper). The government-backed Taiwan Excellence Drone International Business Opportunities Alliance and the Polish Chamber of Unmanned Systems on Wednesday last week signed a memorandum of understanding in Poland to develop a “non-China” supply chain for drones and work together on key technologies. Asked if Taiwan prioritized Poland among central and eastern European countries in drone collaboration, Lin
Renewed border fighting between Thailand and Cambodia showed no signs of abating yesterday, leaving hundreds of thousands of displaced people in both countries living in strained conditions as more flooded into temporary shelters. Reporters on the Thai side of the border heard sounds of outgoing, indirect fire yesterday. About 400,000 people have been evacuated from affected areas in Thailand and about 700 schools closed while fighting was ongoing in four border provinces, said Thai Rear Admiral Surasant Kongsiri, a spokesman for the military. Cambodia evacuated more than 127,000 villagers and closed hundreds of schools, the Thai Ministry of Defense said. Thailand’s military announced that
CABINET APPROVAL: People seeking assisted reproduction must be assessed to determine whether they would be adequate parents, the planned changes say Proposed amendments to the Assisted Reproduction Act (人工生殖法) advanced yesterday by the Executive Yuan would grant married lesbian couples and single women access to legal assisted reproductive services. The proposed revisions are “based on the fundamental principle of respecting women’s reproductive autonomy,” Cabinet spokesperson Michelle Lee (李慧芝) quoted Vice Premier Cheng Li-chiun (鄭麗君), who presided over a Cabinet meeting earlier yesterday, as saying at the briefing. The draft amendment would be submitted to the legislature for review. The Ministry of Health and Welfare, which proposed the amendments, said that experts on children’s rights, gender equality, law and medicine attended cross-disciplinary meetings, adding that
RSS