TORONTO — The alert system on a Delta Air Lines jet that flipped upside down and burst into flames because it tried to land in Toronto final month indicated a excessive charge of descent lower than three seconds earlier than landing, a preliminary report stated Thursday.
The Transportation Security Board of Canada, which issued the report, continues to investigate the Feb. 17 crash-landing during which 21 individuals had been hospitalized.
All 76 passengers and 4 crew members survived when the Delta plane arriving from Minneapolis burst into flames after flipping over and skidding on the tarmac.
The TSB of Canada report says that when the aircraft’s floor proximity warning system sounded 2.6 seconds earlier than landing, the airspeed was 136 knots, or roughly 250 kph (155 mph). It says the aircraft’s touchdown gear folded into the retracted place at landing and the wing indifferent from the fuselage, releasing a cloud of jet gas, which caught fireplace because the aircraft slid alongside the runway.
The fuselage rolled the wrong way up and a big portion of the tail got here off within the course of, the report says.
“Accidents and incidents not often stem from a single trigger,” TSB chair Yoan Marier stated in a video assertion Thursday. “They’re usually the results of a number of complicated, interconnected components, many extending past the plane and its operation to wider systemic points.”
The crew and passengers began evacuating as soon as the aircraft got here to a cease, the report says, including that a number of the passengers had been injured once they unbuckled their seatbelts and fell to the ceiling.
The TSB says it’s not conscious of any points with the seatbelts or seats in the course of the incident.
The cockpit door was jammed shut, forcing pilots to flee by means of the emergency hatch on the ceiling of the cockpit after everybody else was out, the report says.
Emergency response personnel then went into the fuselage, and there was an explosion outdoors the aircraft close to the left wing root shortly afterward, the TSB says. The reason for the explosion has not but been decided.
Up to now, the investigation has discovered no pre-existing issues with the flight controls, although some parts had been broken within the crash, the board stated.
The protection board says its ongoing investigation is specializing in a number of key areas, together with metallurgical examination of the wing construction, touchdown methods, pilot coaching and the passenger evacuation course of.
All of those that had been hospitalized had been launched inside days of the crash.
At the least two lawsuits have been filed in the USA, and a regulation agency in Canada has stated that it’s been retained by a number of passengers.
Delta declined to touch upon the preliminary report.
“We stay absolutely engaged as members within the investigation led by the Transportation Security Board of Canada. Out of respect for the integrity of this work that can proceed by means of their last report, Endeavor Air and Delta will chorus from remark,” the airline stated.
