Chantelle Benjamin
9 May 2004
Johannesburg — Release of crash report closes a chapter, says cricketer's mother
'LET me take it," said pilot Willie Meyer. "You got it," replied co-pilot Ian Noakes. Those were the last words uttered by the two pilots of the plane in which one of SA's most controversial heroes, former cricket captain Hansie Cronjé, died.
The last seconds of the flight's voice recording contain only an eerie warning by the plane's ground proximity warning system - "Pull up, pull up, pull up" - and then silence.
The pilots' last words, captured by the cockpit voice recorder, were released with a report by the South African Civil Aviation Authority on Thursday.
They suggest the men were unaware of the danger they were in until seconds before the plane crashed into the Outeniqua mountains near George in the southern Cape.
Meyer and Noakes referred only once to the Hawker Siddeley 784's warning system, even though it issued more than 13 warnings in the last five minutes of the fatal flight, causing the Civil Aviation Authority to surmise in its report that the men had become disorient ed.
The report concluded that human error, faulty equipment at George Airport and mechanical problems contributed to the plane crash that killed Cronjé and the two pilots in June 2002.
Rain and low cloud is believed to have contributed to the pilots' disorientation, causing them to drift closer to the mountains than they realised.
The airport was unmanned in the early hours of the morning, which meant there was no one there to help the pilots, or to switch on the instrument landing system on Runway 29, which appears to have failed during the night and was only switched back on by a technician later that morning.
According to the report, the pilot had begun an instrument-guided approach to land at George because of the weather. Problems picking up a signal from the instrument landing system forced the pilots to "execute a missed approach".
Meyer can be heard warning Noakes that he is going "miles too fast".
The Civil Aviation Authority said the pilots failed to stick to the required procedure for a missed approach and became disorient ed, probably due to a combination of strong winds and a malfunctioning gyroscope on the aircraft, which helps to indicate direction.
"They flew the aircraft into a valley and crashed into the side of the mountains," the report said.
The report said the crash could not have been survived. The pilots and Cronjé suffered multiple injures in the impact. A net holding heavy items of cargo in place in the rear of the plane partly failed, flinging cargo onto passenger seats directly behind the cockpit where Cronjé was sitting.
Gavin Branson, the chief executive of AirQuarius, the owner of the crashed plane, said a number of airlines had complained about George Airport, where the instrument landing system frequently failed. Reports were produced on the matter in 1998 and 1999.
Between January and June 2002, the system failed more than 40 times on George's Runway 29 and more than 70 times on Runway 11. Both systems have been replaced since the crash.
Branson said he could not comment on findings that the plane had a number of mechanical defects until he had read the report in detail.
The Civil Aviation Authority found, apart from the mal functioning gyroscope, that there was no indication that problems previously identified by pilots in the plane's navigation equipment had ever been solved.
"This rendered the aircraft technically unairworthy," the report said.
However, Seboseso Machobane, acting chief executive of the authority, believes that no single factor could be said to have caused the crash: "It was one of those situations where a series of unfortunate circumstances come together to cause the accident.
"Occurring by themselves, they would not have caused it to happen, but they all happened to click together at the wrong time."
He said anyone who felt aggrieved by the report would be given 30 days to object to the Commissioner for Civil Aviation, Dr André de Kock.
"If the complaint has substance, the report could be altered or a new investigation launched," he said.
The CAA identified problems with the Hawker Siddeley 748's maintenance schedule and has recommended to the aircraft's British manufacturer that it be reviewed.
Cronjé's family welcomed the report but declined to attend its formal presentation on Friday.
Cronjé's mother, Susanna Maria "Sanmarie", said the family were glad the report had finally been released.
"As a parent you are anxious to find out about the last minutes of your loved one, but it's also a sad time for us because this ends a chapter of someone's life," she said.
The family have not yet seen the more than 100-page report, which is being couriered to them.
Cronjé's mother said the family had no intention at this stage of taking legal action against any group or person identified in the report as contributing to the accident.
"As far as I am concerned it is a chapter ended and we have to find the strength now to somehow to carry on. As a parent, losing your child is something you take with you to your grave."
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2004 Sunday Times. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
