A Chinese missile or fuel-tank explosion similar to what brought down TWA Flight 800 off the coast of New York in 1996 were among the theories put forth by aviation experts and other sources yesterday to explain Saturday's China Airlines crash.
Kay Yong (
PHOTO: GEORGE TSORNG, TAIPEI TIMES
The suddenness of the flight's demise -- the plane's pilots reportedly did not radio for help -- had some experts focusing on the possibility that an explosion might have brought the Boeing 747-200 down.
PHOTO: CHANG CHIA-MING, TAIPEI TIMES
According to one anonymous source connected with a Taiwanese think tank, the possibility that a Chinese missile downed the plane can't be ruled out. The People's Liberation Army is currently practicing drills along China's southern coast, the source noted.
Indeed, it wouldn't be the first time that a military misfire has downed a passenger jet. In October, a Russian passenger jet crashed into the Black Sea after being unintentionally hit by an S-200 missile during Ukrainian air defense exercises.
According to the source, China's inventory of military hardware includes a missile known as the S-300 PMU, or "SA-10 grumble." The PLA demonstrated the missile in 1996 just before Taiwan's 1996 presidential election.
But the Hong Kong-based Wen Wei Boa (
The S-300 PMU has a range of 120km, a maximum speed of Mach 7 and would be difficult to be tracked by radar, the anonymous source said.
According to the US Federation of American Scientists, China imported S-300 missiles from Russia in the early 1990s and they are deployed around Beijing. But there is one battery of fixed, long-range S-300s in Zhangzhou in Fujian Province, the source said.
"When an airplane flying at 9,100m collides with any outside force -- say a 1,600kg S-300 missile with a dummy warhead -- the loss of pressure inside the cabin could cause the situation to spin out of control," the source said.
Sudden depressurization inside the cabin would have knocked out the pilots, preventing them from sending a Mayday.
Other signs suggesting an accidental Chinese missile strike were Beijing's unusual friendliness in expressing concern over the tragedy and its offer to help search for survivors just hours after the accident; reports from pro-China media that were quick to downplay any connection between China's military exercises and the accident; and Premier Yu Shyi-kun taking command of search-and-rescue efforts in Penghu. Never before has the premier been placed in charge of an air crash accident, sources said.
TWA FLIGHT 800
One veteran pilot who contacted the Taipei Times yesterday said Saturday's crash bore striking similarities to the crash of TWA Flight 800 off the coast of Long Island, New York in 1996.
The pilot sought to keep his identity private for fear of reprisals from the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA).
"Talking to several other pilots after we heard about the crash, we all agreed it suffered the same fate as TWA Flight 800 -- a center fuel-tank explosion," the pilot said.
After nearly four years of investigation, US inspectors said an explosion of vapors inside a fuel tank caused TWA Flight 800 to plunge into the ocean -- in a safety problem that may involve thousands of commercial aircraft built by a number of different manufacturers.
The Taiwan-based pilot alleged that China Airlines knew its 747-200 was vulnerable to the safety problem surrounding the troublesome fuel tank but failed to eliminate the risk.
Government officials yesterday ordered China Airlines to ground its four remaining Boeing 747-200s, which are used for cargo delivery.
As many airplanes do, TWA Flight 800 took off with just 50 to 100 gallons of fuel in its center tank. The procedure is used on short-haul flights to cut the overall weight of the plane and thus save on expensive jet fuel costs.
In the case of TWA 800, experts said fumes inside the tank were heated to above the temperature at which they become explosive -- dooming the 747. What's not known is what ignited the blast.
China Airlines flight CI611 also took off with its center tank nearly empty -- a procedure that Boeing recommended be discontinued after the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in 1998 said fuel pumps on older model 747 planes were a possible source of faulty wiring that could have ignited the TWA blast.
"The FAA today issued an Airworthiness Directive prohibiting dry operation of the center wing tank override/jettison pumps ..." on applicable 747 airplanes, Boeing said in the statement to all owners of the planes.
The pilot said China Airlines continued the risky practice "because here in Taiwan everything is about money."
Warnings from boeing
China Airlines vice president of flight safety, Samson Yeh (
"At the time ... I remember we changed the procedure. In terms of empty fuel tanks we were not supposed to use the fuel pumps [when we flew with dry tanks], otherwise you will overheat it. I believe [the maintenance department] also put some insulation on the wiring, to isolate [potential sparks]," Yeh said.
Yeh did concede that while an overheated fuel tank was "one of the possibilities" behind the sudden mid-air break up, "this case is different from [TWA 800] because that one was caused by the center fuel tank overheating, whereas this one was a sudden explosion -- which means it's totally different."
Another option for planes designated specifically for short-haul flights is the removal of the center tank and its pump -- a costly and time-consuming process, according to the pilot.
A 16-year veteran for an international carrier, but based in Taiwan, the anonymous pilot said many cabin crews know China airlines' last remaining passenger 747-200 was flying with the potential risk, but that reporting the issue to civil authorities -- charged with overseeing the two national carriers -- could result in the loss of their jobs.
No Taiwan-based pilots want to say anything negative about "the airline industry in Taiwan. They [officials] are very vindictive. We all have to do our PC," he said, referring to a "precision check," a test required by the CAA every six months that allows pilots to stay in the air. "If we said anything they'd fail us for sure."
Another similarity between Saturday's crash and the crash of TWA Flight 800 is that in the latter, many speculated that a missile brought the plane down.
But crash investigators later concluded that it wasn't a missile or a bomb blast that downed the plane.
"High-energy explosions leave distinctive damage signatures such as severe pitting, cratering, hot gas washing and petaling," said Bernard Loeb, director of the US National Transportation Safety Bureau last year. "No such damage was found on any portion of the recovered airplane structure."
The physical evidence "leads to the inescapable conclusion that the cause of the in-flight breakup of TWA Flight 800 was a fuel-air explosion inside the center wing tank," Loeb said.
The Philippines is working behind the scenes to enhance its defensive cooperation with Taiwan, the Washington Post said in a report published on Monday. “It would be hiding from the obvious to say that Taiwan’s security will not affect us,” Philippine Secretary of National Defense Gilbert Teodoro Jr told the paper in an interview on Thursday last week. Although there has been no formal change to the Philippines’ diplomatic stance on recognizing Taiwan, Manila is increasingly concerned about Chinese encroachment in the South China Sea, the report said. The number of Chinese vessels in the seas around the Philippines, as well as Chinese
‘A SERIOUS THREAT’: Japan has expressed grave concern over the Strait’s security over the years, which demonstrated Tokyo’s firm support for peace in the area, an official said China’s military drills around Taiwan are “incompatible” with peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait, Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs Takeshi Iwaya said during a meeting with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi (王毅) on Thursday. “Peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait is important for the international community, including Japan,” Iwaya told Wang during a meeting on the sidelines of the ASEAN-related Foreign Ministers’ Meetings in Kuala Lumpur. “China’s large-scale military drills around Taiwan are incompatible with this,” a statement released by the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Thursday cited Iwaya as saying. The Foreign Ministers’ Meetings are a series of diplomatic
URBAN COMBAT: FIM-92 Stinger shoulder-fired missiles from the US made a rare public appearance during early-morning drills simulating an invasion of the Taipei MRT The ongoing Han Kuang military exercises entered their sixth day yesterday, simulating repelling enemy landings in Penghu County, setting up fortifications in Tainan, laying mines in waters in Kaohsiung and conducting urban combat drills in Taipei. At 5am in Penghu — part of the exercise’s first combat zone — participating units responded to a simulated rapid enemy landing on beaches, combining infantry as well as armored personnel. First Combat Zone Commander Chen Chun-yuan (陳俊源) led the combined armed troops utilizing a variety of weapons systems. Wang Keng-sheng (王鏗勝), the commander in charge of the Penghu Defense Command’s mechanized battalion, said he would give
‘REALISTIC’ APPROACH: The ministry said all the exercises were scenario-based and unscripted to better prepare personnel for real threats and unexpected developments The army’s 21st Artillery Command conducted a short-range air defense drill in Taoyuan yesterday as part of the Han Kuang exercises, using the indigenous Sky Sword II (陸射劍二) missile system for the first time in the exercises. The armed forces have been conducting a series of live-fire and defense drills across multiple regions, simulating responses to a full-scale assault by Chinese forces, the Ministry of National Defense said. The Sky Sword II missile system was rapidly deployed and combat-ready within 15 minutes to defend Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport in a simulated attack, the ministry said. A three-person crew completed setup and
RSS