Pilots Tried to Contact Controllers (Brazil Crash)
Pilots Tried to Contact Controllers
Posted: November 20th, 2006 09:58 AM PDT
A minute-by-minute account of the Sept. 29 midair collision over the Amazon jungle details how two Long Island pilots tried 19 times to contact air traffic controllers - until one second before the fatal crash.
The report shows that Brazilian air traffic control instruments - including primary radar, transponder and radio contact - completely lost track of the corporate jet flown by the pair twice in the fateful 26 minutes before the plane clipped wings at 37,000 feet with a Boeing jetliner.
The pilots, Joseph Lepore, 42, of Bay Shore, and Jan Paladino, 34, of Westhampton Beach, repeatedly tried to radio air traffic control in Brasilia over an eight-minute span, but got no answer, according to the account.
The crash caused the Boeing 737 to dive almost 7 miles to the ground, killing all 154 people aboard. Lepore and Paladino were able to land their damaged Embraer Legacy. They have not been charged, but have not been allowed to leave the country.
Brazilian authorities have maintained that there are no blind spots in radar or radio coverage in their skies. But other pilots have said dangerous gaps persist over the Amazon basin despite a $1.4 billion overhaul of the country's air traffic control system completed only last year.
In the days following the disaster, Lepore and Paladino were accused of causing the crash by flying recklessly - turning off the radio and shutting off the transponder. The report did not address these accusations.
But recent evidence indicates that air traffic controllers failed to realize that the planes were on a collision course, and may have actually steered the two jets to the same altitude.
A report released Thursday in Portuguese by Brazilian air force officials and translated by Newsday gave the following account:
The control center in Brasilia lost the signal from the Legacy's transponder at 4:02 p.m., seven minutes after the Legacy turned onto the UZ6 air lane connecting Brasilia with Manaus. The Boeing was flying from Manaus to Brasilia along the same lane.
Controllers began calling the Legacy 24 minutes later, making six unsuccessful attempts between 4:26 p.m. and 4:34 p.m.
At 4:38 - 18 minutes before impact - ground radar lost track of the Legacy, meaning controllers had no indication of the Legacy's position.
The report does not make clear whether ground radar contact was ever re-established before the crash.
Meanwhile, at 4:48 p.m., the Legacy began a series of 12 attempts in four minutes to radio the Brasilia center.
At 4:53, Brasilia attempted to tell the Legacy to call controllers in Manaus. It was the first time the Legacy's pilots were able to hear the controllers in 62 minutes. But the pilots only got a partial message. They tried unsuccessfully to radio Brasilia seven more times, asking controllers to repeat the message. The last attempt was made one second before the 4:56 p.m. collision.
The report also said the Legacy traveled at a steady 37,000 feet its entire flight - 1,000 feet lower at the point of impact than called for by the Legacy's flight plan. But the report did not say whether recorded conversations indicate that controllers altered the flight plan by ordering the Legacy to fly at 37,000 feet the entire way, as Lepore and Paladino claimed.
A Brazilian air force spokesman said the report does not address whether the controllers verbally altered the flight plan, which would clear the pilots, because an examination of the recordings hasn't been completed.
Off the radar
Preliminary report by Brazilian authorities notes three problems tracking a Legacy jet that collided with a passenger jetliner:
4:02 p.m.: Failure of the Legacy's transponder, which gives air traffic controllers the flight's altitude.
4:30: Two-minute loss of ground radar, which gives location.
4:38: Ground radar loses the Legacy again. Report not clear on when or whether contact was re-established.
4:56: Planes collide.
