Air France Crash Jet 'Had Rudder Problem'

Air France Crash Jet 'Had Rudder Problem'

news.sky .com

A safety expert claims the Air France plane that crashed into the Atlantic sent out a message about a rudder problem before it disappeared.

The aircraft, with 228 people on board, transmitted a total of 24 automatic messages.
The official, who claims to have access to the French investigation, said the device in question controls how far the plane's rudder can move.

(visit the link for the full news article)

This is an interesting turn of events as all initial accounts of plane breaking up in mid air is actually true and the report that no burns or water found in bodies seems to fill in the puzzle as to how this has happened.

This is also very disturbing as it might just show a structural problem with the plane itself.

news.sky .com
(visit the link for the full news article)


edit: Related link to previous ats thread can be found here it is something i firmly believed from the moment i begun reading on such peculiar accident.

[edit on 14-6-2009 by tristar]

reply to post by tristar


This rudder problem strangely mimics the series of rudder problem caused by servo motors that controls rudder movement, which cause the crash of of Boeing 737's in the 90's. This problem was considered to be isolated to the 737 alone.

Maybe this applies to the Airbus series as well.

Take a look at this article.

Airline safety

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that `expert` is talking #



thats the ACARS list

www.iag-inc.com...

thats the podcast from the company that makes the ACARS explaining what each of the entries means.

the sky expert is talking crap.

Please forgive me if I am wrong , but as is being reported, a "rudder problem" is not going to cause a plane to break up over several minutes. I don't like this whole scenario. I haven't figured out what the hell is going on, but this is a cover-up of something none the less.

I agree (with my scant knowledge of plane workings) that rudder problems seem unlikely on their own to cause the plane to crash. However, combined with the theory that the plane was going far too fast it kinda adds up. \
Imagine the plane going really really fast, maybe approaching the sound barrier, and then the rudder sticks to one side and won't move, and the plane gets twisted and breaks apart in the air.
Plausible?
Maybe...

Was the Airbus330-200 hacked in midair ? Meaning someone onboard with an interface to the airplanes computer system created the multiple malfunctions ? I read the ACARS analysis and it seems like a total breakdown of all systems even the backup.

Maybe the plane hit an EMP field created by something, (underground nuculear test, solar flare?)


In the uk a couple years ago,the military told remote village they were testing a new technology and that mobile phones and stuff would not work for a few hours while they did it. it was not in the papers after at all. Maybe this was the same thing?

What about flight 587.... Airbus A300 that crashed in New York, November 2001. I remember seeing a documentary on this and the investigation concluded that excessive use of the rudder at speed had caused the entire vertical stabilizer of the aircraft to snap off!

en.wikipedia.org...

reply to post by spg595


nothing at all related

different aircraft , different control system.

reply to post by Harlequin


The only relation is the use of a composite material for the verticle tail surface. Its possible that severe turbulance may have caused the rudder to break off, but in that scenario the aircraft should have the ability to squack and emergency code or get off a mayday before the airframe broke up if at all.

Im not saying its what happened and I agree everything I have read about the ACARS for the doomed flight indicates otherwise.

As far as an EMP effect, that would have set off every DSP satelite that was over the area and the effects would have been measure from pretty far away.

If the rudder did shear off wouldn't that cause structural problems, as a result a sudden decompression, add the storm and wind speed and the sudden loss of Yaw. That would creative pressures on the fuselage that are obviously not factored in. I guess one could say they factored in but if the engines cut out, that would loose Pitch and eventually create a violent Roll. So those pressures would be unbearable on the integrity of the fuselage and would cause what we now have at hand.

I can see how that would literally tear apart the whole aircraft in mid air. Either way i am almost certain that the passengers felt and were wide awake whiles the plane was breaking up and probably died from asphyxiation.

reply to post by tristar


We have to see another angle. Not only an rudder shear, but a rudder system failure. As I mentioned in a earlier post, the rudder systems of the 737 were prone to jamming and even reversing, so it the rudder jammed in one direction, the plane only had one chance, a steep bank and fall.

Here is an example of the US Air flight 427

After the longest investigation in aviation history—more than four and a half years—the concluding statement said: The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of the USAir flight 427 accident was a loss of control of the airplane resulting from the movement of the rudder surface to its blowdown limit. The rudder surface most likely deflected in a direction opposite to that commanded by the pilots as a result of a jam of the main rudder power control unit servo valve secondary slide to the servo valve housing offset from its neutral position and overtravel of the primary slide. The NTSB concluded that similar rudder problems caused the previously mysterious 3 March 1991 crash of United Airlines Flight 585, and the 9 June 1996 incident involving Eastwind Airlines Flight 517, both of which were Boeing 737s. As a result of the investigation, pilots were warned of and trained how to deal with insufficient aileron authority at an airspeed at or less than 190 knots (218 mph, 354 km/h), formerly the usual approach speed for a B737. Four additional channels of information—pilot rudder pedal commands—were incorporated into flight data recorders, while Boeing redesigned the rudder system on 737s and retrofitted existing craft until the affected systems could be replaced. The United States Congress also required airlines to deal more sensitively with the families of crash victims.

US Air Flight 427

what I find intriguing is the number of Capt and F/O "PFD flags". Not enough information, but an electrical surge resulting from a lightning strike usually creates a series of flags.....Maybe it has been said, but overcontrol from a PFD failure in darkness could cause overcontrol, resulting in severe "unusual attitudes", resulting in large rudder deflection, resulting in rudder limiter action.....