Investigators composed of US and Taiwanese aviation experts yesterday ruled out air traffic control mistakes or weather conditions as causes of Saturday's deadly China Airlines crash as they expanded the investigation's search area.
"Weather conditions and air traffic control had nothing to do with the crash," said Managing Director of the Aviation Safety Council (ASC) Yong Kay (
"The weather conditions over the Makung area from 3pm to 4pm on May 25 were quite good," Yong said based on related data gathered from the Central Weather Bureau, the Civil Aviation Bureau's weather center as well as the Japanese GSM5 weather satellite.
PHOTO: GEORGE TSORNG, TAIPEI TIMES
As the critical 72-hour post-crash search period passed yesterday, investigators expanded the area of search for wreckage and for the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder -- the so-called "black boxes" -- of the crashed plane.
"The search area today [yesterday] reached 16,129km2, with 228 vessels joining the effort," said Minister of Transportation and Communications Lin Lin-shan (林陵三).
A total of 258 vessels would be on the sea by early this morning, as another 30 Kaohsiung-based naval vessels were to joining the search team in Penghu, Lin said.
Officials, however, admitted the investigation and search efforts still have a long way to go.
"The debris retrieved so far constitutes only 0.1 percent of the crashed plane," Yong said.
Yong added that none of the wreckage found has shown any trace of fire.
Although the black boxes had yet to be found, the chances were not high that the units would fall into an oceanic trench of 150m to 200m in depth in the Taiwan Strait as currents were expected to push the units and wreckage northwest -- in the opposite direction from the location of the trench, Yong said.
Yong said that signals emitted by the two units were expected to become weaker and weaker after 20 to 25 days, although their batteries could last up to 30 days.
"If we can't recover the black boxes by the 20th day, then it could get difficult," Yong said.
Three more bodies were recovered yesterday, bringing the number of bodies found to 86 in total, leaving 140 missing.
Aside from the expansion of the scale of the search, assistance from the US side also grew yesterday as four experts from the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and two staffers from the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) joined the investigation.
A NTSB expert, who brought an underwater locator with him, embarked with an expert from the US aerospace firm Boeing and an ASC staffer to scour the area, but the search yielded no concrete results, said Tracy Jen (任靜怡), spokeswoman for the investigative team.
Experts from the Boeing, the jumbo jet's manufacturer, and from Pratt and Whitney, the engine's manufacturer, arrived in Penghu on Monday to help with the investigation.
According to Annex 13 to the International Civil Aviation Convention, the states of registry, operator, design and manufacture have the right to appoint an Accredited Representative to the investigation led by the country where the accident occurred.
The US experts yesterday also examined the wreckage that has been recovered so far, which has been placed in a warehouse at the Makung air force base.
Greg Philip, an NTSB expert serving as the accredited representative of the US team, said it was too early to speculate on reasons behind the crash, considering the evidence and information gathered so far.
"We just looked to see what was there and get an idea of what we are very working with," Philip said of the examination of the recovered debris, adding: "We'll stay as long as we are needed."
The ASC said on Sunday that the airliner, with 225 people aboard, had broken apart into four huge pieces at an altitude of more than 9,144m.
While some underwater search-and-retrieval companies from Taiwan joined the search yesterday, experts from the Massachusetts-based American Underwater Search and Survey Ltd are scheduled to reach Taiwan tomorrow, sources said.
The team, composed of veteran marine search experts such as John Perry Fish, will do a preliminary assessment of the situation in Penghu before determining the sort of equipment needed for the location and recovery efforts in the Strait, Yong said.
Meanwhile, over 350 relatives of the victims of the crash embarked on a navy ship yesterday, amid choppy seas, to call home the souls of the dead .
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