Pilots Say ATC To Blame For Issuing Nonstandard Altitude
Federal investigators in Brazil concluded this week the two
American pilots of an Embraer Legacy 600 business jet should be
held liable for the September 29 midair collision that brought down
a Gol Airlines 737 over the Amazon.
Brazil's O Globo newspaper reports federal authorities found
pilots Joseph Lepore and Jan Paladino failed to notice the Legacy's
transponder was not transmitting, until after their aircraft and
the airliner clipped each other. The Legacy was able to execute a
successful emergency landing, but the airliner crashed in the
jungle, claiming all 154 people onboard.
A spokeswoman for federal police investigator Renato Sayao
confirmed to The Associated Press the criminal investigation into
the accident had ended, with its findings sent on to the Justice
Ministry. She refused to discuss its findings, however, or say when
the report would be released officially.
Both pilots have denied any wrongdoing in the accident. As Aero-News reported, the
two aircraft collided at 37,000 feet, an altitude normally reserved
by ICAO guidelines for eastbound aircraft. Lepore and Paladino were
flying on a northwesterly heading, and wouldn't normally have been
at that altitude... but Paladino said they were flying at an
altitude assigned by ATC, adding, "Air traffic controllers have
responsibility to manage that traffic."
"We were compliant with all regulations," Paladino said in a
December interview. "We were doing exactly what we were supposed to
be doing, and we just experienced, automatically, just a jolt out
of nowhere."
Joel Weiss, an attorney for the pilots, states Brazilian police
are too quick to blame the American pilots.
"From the press reports, it would appear that the police have
prematurely accused the pilots in response to public pressure and
have not conducted a complete and thorough investigation of the
facts," Weiss wrote in an e-mail to the AP.
Brazilian investigators
have conceded air traffic controllers bear some responsibility for
the accident. The civil investigation did not focus on what role
ATC may have had in the crash, however, as controllers fall under
military jurisdiction in that country.
Lepore and Paladino were detained in a Rio de Janeiro hotel for
over two months following the accident. They were allowed to leave
Brazil in December, but not before being charged by police for "endangering
air safety." Both men have said they would return to
Brazil to face any criminal charges.
Last week, the National Transportation Safety Board issued three safety recommendations related to
the Gol Airlines investigation, aimed at solving what
the Board called a "critical safety issue" when traffic collision
avoidance systems (TCAS) fail, without the flight crew's knowledge.
Those systems rely on functioning transponders to operate.
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