BERLIN (AP) – Swiss investigators said Thursday that “high-risk flying” of pilots of a vintage propeller plane caused a 2018 crash in the Alps that killed all 20 people on board.
The 79-year-old Junkers Ju-52, operated by local airline Ju-Air, crashed in southeastern Switzerland on August 4, 2018.
The plane, which was carrying 17 passengers and three crew members, crashed almost vertically into a mountain. It flew from Locarno in southern Switzerland to its base near Zurich.
The Swiss Board of Investigation on Transport Safety said in its final report that “the high-risk flight of pilots was the direct cause of the accident.”
When they entered a narrow mountain valley, “the pilot crew was piloting the plane at low altitude, with no possibility of alternate flight path and at a dangerously low speed due to the circumstances,” the researchers said.
When the plane hit turbulence in the valley, “the high-risk mode of flying through these unusual turbulences caused pilots to lose control of the plane,” they added. The plane was flying too low to have enough space to recover.
The report also found that the plane’s center of gravity was too far from the rear during the doomed flight, a “dangerous situation (caused) by improper flight preparation and errors in the Ju-Air software.”
He said the pilots “had become accustomed … to not complying with the rules for safe flight operations and taking high risks even with passengers on board,” and that Ju-Air did not recognize the risks or avoid them. that violate the rules.
The report also blamed the Swiss Federal Aviation Office for failing to identify “numerous security issues” on Ju-Air or being ineffective in dealing with them.
That office, in March 2019, revoked Ju-Air’s commercial flight license after reviewing the risks of passenger flights with old planes, but said it could, if it meets several conditions, continue private flights for members. registered.
Ju-Air said in a statement Thursday that “it will do everything to learn from the accident.”
He said he was “happy that the direct causes of the accident could be clearly shown” and discussed the issue of a problem with the center of gravity. Assessments suggest the problem first arose 35 years before the crash, but that it had not caused problems in the meantime and that Ju-Air or regulators had not noticed this, the company said.
He added that the problems that caused the risk behavior of the pilots not to be discovered will be addressed in the future selection, training and supervision of the pilots.