iiiikiwomilawmfiimimmmi WORLD NEWS
Findings in crash of Alaska Airlines Flight 261 reveal possible cause
Radar may reveal piece falling from doomed plane
by J. Lynn Lunsford
Knight-Ridder Tribune
February 08, 2000
Radar that tracked Alaska Airlines
Flight 261 may show a piece of the
aircraft falling from the plane shortly
before it crashed, sources say.
National Transportation Safety
Board officials were analyzing pre
liminary radar information late Mon
day, February 7, but sources said that
at least two Southern California ra
dar sites had detected a small "tar
get" that separated from the main
image of the McDonnell Douglas
MD-83 in the seconds before the
crash.
It was impossible to tell the size
of the piece. Radar is sensitive
enough to pick up objects as small
as a briefcase.
The radar tracked the object until
it fell into the ocean about four miles
from where Flight 261 crashed. In
vestigators suspect that it came from
the tail section of the aircraft just be
. fore it flipped and tumbled 17,000
feet into the Pacific Ocean on Jan.
• 31, killing all 88 people on board.
The airplane was being prepared
for an emergency landing in Los An
geles after the crew reported that the
horizontal stabilizer was jammed.
The airplane had departed from
Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, and was
scheduled to stop in San Francisco
and Seattle.
The horizontal stabilizer on an
MD-80 series aircraft is a movable
40-foot wing atop the tail that con
trols the up and down stability of the
airplane. By making small adjust
ments to the stabilizer using switches
on the pilot's control wheel, the
plane can be trimmed in such a way
McCain surges, punctures Bush's campaign
by Jodi Enda
Knight-Ridder Tribune
February 14, 2000
COLUMBIA, S.C. —The camp of the
one-time fighter pilot is festive, cel
ebrating the fact that he is alive at all.
The camp of the one-time frat-boy is
hunkered down, fighting for its very
survival.
As Arizona Sen. John McCain and
Texas Gov. George W. Bush gird for a
crucial GOP Presidential primary here
Saturday, their moods and those of
their supporters reflect the unexpected
turns of events that have transformed
their contest from a lopsided jaunt into
a vital and at times bitter race.
A star-struck crowd of at least 1,000
people jammed in line outside the
Chapter 11 discount bookstore in At
lanta Sunday, hoping to get McCain
Britain suspends Northern Irelan
by Ray Moseley
Chicago Tribune
February 13, 2000
LONDON Britain suspended on
Friday the ten-week-old Northern Ire
land government in which Catholics
and Protestants shared power, holding
that there had been insufficient
progress in efforts to get the Irish Re
publican Army to give up its arms.
But hours later an independent com
mission with responsibility for the
arms question issued a fresh report
saying the IRA had indicated earlier
in the day it "will initiate a compre
hensive process to put arms beyond
use, in a manner as to ensure maxi
mum public confidence."
The commission headed by Cana
dian Gen. John de Chastelain said the
IRA statement "holds out the real pros
pect of an agreement" which will en
able the commission to fulfill its man
date. The commission's mandate ex
pires on May 22, when disarmament
by the IRA and all other paramilitary
groups, Catholic and Protestant, is
supposed to be completed.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair's
office welcomed the report as "a de
velopment of real significance." But
Britain's Northern Ireland secretary,
Peter Mandelson, said it remained un
clear whether the IRA had now given
a commitment to disarm.
He said if the IRA gives a commit
ment, and a time frame for complet
ing disarmament, that would "open the
way" for him to lift the suspension of
the Northern Ireland government.
"The statement implies many
things, but they [the IRA] don't state
unequivocally what they mean,"
Mandelson said.
that it is easier to fly.
Experts say that if the horizontal
stabilizer or some part of it
failed, the resulting changes in aero
dynamic forces could easily cause
the airplane to become uncontrol
lable.
"The eyewitnesses said the air
plane was tumbling and spinning,
which would indicate a loss of tail
effectiveness of some kind," said
aviation consultant C.O. Miller, a
former senior safety board investi
gator. "If you have something on
radar coming off this airplane, it
could go a long way toward solving
it."
Flight 261 had been cruising at
31,000 feet when it went into a 90-
second dive that took it to 23,700
feet before the crew regained con
trol. After that, a flight attendant told
the pilots that she had heard a loud
noise in the rear of the aircraft. The
pilots said they had heard it too. A
second noise, which could have been
a piece of the airplane breaking
away, occurred just before the air
plane plunged out of control.
If a splash site for the piece that
fell off the airplane is pinpointed, of
ficials will send U.S. Navy vessels
in search of it. Over the last few
years, the Navy has been able to find
and retrieve key pieces of airplanes
that fell into the ocean, including the
cargo door that ripped away from a
United Airlines Boeing 747, which
later landed in Honolulu with a gap
ing hole in its side.
Several years ago. radar informa
tion was used to find the engine from
an American Airlines MD-80 that
fell from the jetliner over the desert
in the western United States. A he
licopter flew directly to where the
to autograph a copy of his book, Faith
of My Fathers. Meanwhile Bush was
defensive and testy in an hour-long TV
grilling about his embattled campaign.
McCain's mighty surge, first in the
New Hampshire primary, then in polls
both here and nationwide, has under
cut a central tenet of Bush's campaign,
the argument that he was the Republi
can most likely to take back the White
House from the Democrats.
With that essential claim punctured
one recent national poll shows Bush
losing to Vice President Gore but
McCain beating the Democratic front
runner Bush has been forced to
fight for the nomination that once ap
peared inevitably his. After McCain
pummeled him in New Hampshire,
Bush re-emerged here last week with
a new style and strategy that focuses
almost entirely on winning South
In a day of swift-moving develop
ments, Mandelson announced in
Belfast early Friday evening he had
decided with regret to suspend the new
government. He said "real progress"
had been made in resolving the crisis
in the last week, but not enough to jus
tify his withholding the suspension.
With his decision, power over
Northern Ireland affairs reverted to the
British government. The Northern Ire
land executive, legislative assembly,
and cross-border bodies with the Irish
Republic went into the deep freeze.
Only minutes before Mandelson
spoke. the leader of the IRA's politi
cal wing Sinn Fein President Gerry
Adams said his party had submit
ted a "breakthrough proposition" to
the British and Irish governments on
resolving the impasse.
Mandelson then appeared to brush
aside Adams' statement by saying the
arms issue could not be overcome by
a "last-minute rush on a Friday after-
noon."
Later he said he only received a
copy of Adams' statement 20 minutes
after he had announced the suspen
sion, and had not yet read it. He also
said he had not seen the new de
Chastelain report when he announced
suspension, but said its content would
not have altered his decision.
A Sinn Fein official, Alex Maskey,
said Mandelson's statements were un
true. He said Mandelson was fully
aware of the Sinn Fein proposal be
fore he announced suspension, and
knew of the new report as well.
After suspension was announced,
Sinn Fein Chairman Mitchel
McLaughlin, in New York, said: "We
will castigate the British government,
we will punish the British govern-
engine landed based on the radar
track.
Even if officials do not find what
ever fell from the plane, it could be
possible to determine what happened
from looking at the main wreckage.
Safety board Chairman Jim Hall was
scheduled to give an update on the
investigation on Tuesday afternoon,
Feb. 15.
The crash site is in about 650 feet
of water about ten miles off the Cali
fornia coast northwest of Los Ange
les. Most of the wreckage is in small
pieces that are strewn along the hard
sandy bottom in an area the size of a
football field.
A source familiar with the inves
tigation said the aircraft "is so bro
ken up that it is impossible to tell
whether it is all there or not."
Several pieces of the tail section
have been identified on videotapes
taken by remote-control
submersibles, but few are larger than
three feet long. The parts of the tail
that have been identified include a
five-foot section of the leading edge
of the horizontal stabilizer and a
three- to four-foot piece of the spar
that provides the structural backbone
of the stabilizer. Other parts identi
fied include a five- to seven-foot
piece of skin from the outside of the
vertical stabilizer on which the
company's logo, a smiling Eskimo,
is painted.
They said a key part of the system
that could lead to a catastrophic fail
ure is the jackscrew that adjusts the
stabilizer.
A jackscrew is a long, threaded rod
on which the stabilizer is mounted.
It operates much like a garage door
opener: when it turns, the stabilizer
moves up or down, depending on the
Carolina.
Now, the easy-going governor de
scribes himself as a fighter, a reformer,
a leader.
Someone, in short, like John
McCain.
McCain, meanwhile, is so energized
by his 19-point New Hampshire vic
tory and his enthusiastic reception here
that his bus tour of the state has be
come something of a rolling celebra
tion. To be sure, the former Navy pi
lot and Vietnam prisoner of war re
mains serious about his ultimate goal
and his notions of how to get there.
Bush's disposition permeates his
crowds, too.
But while the often-genial governor
capably knocks off occasional jokes,
he is more apt of late to strike a seri
ous tone, one that is intended to con
vince voters of the gravity of his quest
ment, we will take them to court if nec
essary." Sinn Fein had earlier threat
ened legal action to challenge the sus
pension.
The suspension forestalled the
threatened resignation of Northern Ire
land First Minister David Trimble,
which would have brought about the
collapse of the power-sharing govern
ment in which Sinn Fein holds two
Cabinet posts alongside Protestants
and representatives of the Catholic
"there can be no
further place in
the politics of
Northern Ireland
for private armies
and their guns."
-David Trimble,
First Minister of
Northern Ireland
Social Democratic and Labor Party.
Trimble had planned to put his res
ignation into effect on Saturday at a
meeting of his Ulster Unionist Party's
860-member council in Belfast. But
sources in Belfast said Trimble, dis
satisfied with what he had heard from
Sinn Fein officials on Friday, threat
ened to resign immediately unless
Mandelson announced suspension of
the government.
Referring to that, Adams said it was
"quite bizarre" that Mandelson had
acted in response "to a Uniorist
direction it is turning.
Two electric motors, one more
powerful than the other, drive the
jackscrew and can be controlled
from the cockpit.
Officials know that the jetliner's
crew was battling problems with the
horizontal stabilizer for more than 30
minutes before the airplane crashed.
They told air traffic controllers and
the company's maintenance experts
in Seattle that the stabilizer had "run
away" and was jammed in a posi
tion that was forcing the airplane's
nose downward.
Since the accident, investigators
and pilots who flew the aircraft have
1997 check found faulty stabilizer part
by J. Lynn Lunsford
Knight-Ridder Tribune
February 14, 2000
An inspection in 1997 of the
stabilizer trim on the Alaska Air
lines jet that crashed two weeks
ago showed that it was worn out
and needed to be replaced, fed
eral officials said Sunday night.
But for unexplained reasons,
the jackscrew assembly was not
replaced. Instead, maintenance
records show it passed five sub
sequent inspections the next day,
officials said.
The National Transportation
Safety Board declined to say
what the new information meant,
but sources close to the investi
gation said that investigators will
try to determine why mainte
nance workers changed their
opinion after the first inspection.
Investigators think that a worn
jackscrew assembly may have led
and the depth of his desire.
Having tossed aside his stump
speech, Bush now appears less sure
footed than McCain. He often
stumbles through his lines and slaugh
ters the grammar while striving to en
gage inure directly with his audiences.
While Bush's crowds are less bois
terous than McCain's, they seem to be
no less committed to their man in
fact, as the backbone of the Republi
can Party, they may be more likely to
show up on primary day.
Bush describes himself as a "cold
eyed realist" who can make things
happen in Washington. And despite
polls that show him in a tight race here,
his supporters hold firm to the view
that he is their party's best shot in No
vember. Knight-Ridder correspon
dent Ben Stocking contributed to this
article.
threat."
After long refusal by the Unionists
to set up the power-sharing govern
ment because of the arms issue, they
changed their minds last November—
but with the proviso they would not
continue with the administration un
less the IRA started disposing of arms
by Jan. 31. The new government was
established on Dec. 2.
The de Chastelain commission re
ported at the end of January that IRA
disarmament had not begun and it had
been unable to learn from the IRA
when it would. De Chastelain's report
was only released by the British gov
ernment on Friday, and in it the com
mission suggested its own dissolution
if there were no significant progress
on the arms issue.
There is no road map showing
where Northern Ireland goes from
here. Mandelson indicated Britain
will try to "put flesh on the bones" of
the IRA statement in coming days.
But much may depend on Ulster
Unionist reaction to the statement.
Jeffrey Donaldson, a prominent Ulster
Unionist who opposes the Good Fri
day agreement, said Friday night the
statement was "ambiguous" and
"doesn't give us much more than we
had before."
The last previous power-sharing
government in Northern Ireland was
set up in 1974. It collapsed within
weeks amid violence from both sides,
and it took another 24 years to pro
duce the Good Friday peace agree
ment.
President Clinton, Blair, and the
prime ministers of the Irish Republic,
Bertie Ahern, were involved on Fri
day in a late round of telephone con
versations about the crisis before
been puzzled about why stabilizer
problems would result in the loss of
control of the aircraft. Procedures
in the airplane's flight manual spell
out what to do for stabilizer prob
lems, including making emergency
landings with a jammed stabilizer if
the problem cannot be fixed.
Pilots say it is relatively easy to
land an MD-83 with a jammed sta
bilizer, although it could take the
strength of both crew members to
pull the nose up for landing.
In the week since the crash, three
U.S. jetliners have returned to their
gates because of stabilizer problems.
Two can probably be traced to the
to the Jan. 31 crash of Alaska
Flight 261 off the coast of Cali
fornia. All 88 people aboard
were killed when the airplane
dived out of control at 18,000
feet.
The jackscrew is a two-foot
threaded rod on which the stabi
lizer assembly moves. The sta
bilizer is a 40-foot wing mo unted
atop the tail that controls the
airplane's up-and-down pitch.
Maintenance records from the
airplane have raised serious ques
tions among investigators about
why the critical component was
not replaced based on its first in
spection.
According to a statement re
leased Sunday from the safety
board, the McDonnell Douglas
MD-83 underwent a heavy main
tenance check in September 1997
at the airline's facility in Oak
land, Calif. It was the most re
cent maintenance in which the
WASHINGTON -Publisher Steve Forbes, left, and his wife Sabina wave
to supporters in Washington, D.C., Thursday, Feb. 10, shortly after his
dropping out of the race for the GOP Presidential nomination. Forbes
abandoned his second presidential campaign Wednesday after spend
ing more than $66 million of his estimated $440 million personal for
tune in a six-year bid for the White House.
government
Mandelson finally acted.
All emphasized that they did not
expect the suspension to become per
manent but looked to political parties
in Northern Ireland to continue the
search for a solution.
"It is a suspension. It is not an an
nulment," said a spokesman for Blair.
"The prime minister still believes it
should be possible to implement the
Good Friday agreement in full."
Ahern said Thursday, February 10,
however, that his government had
"concerns about suspension" and be
lieved it was not in line with terms of
the Good Friday agreement.
The Irish have said they fear that
suspension will make it impossible to
achieve progress on disarmament. But
they have suggested they will not al
low the disagreement to upset their
relations with Britain.
In the past week Irish officials have
met frequently with Sinn Fein repre
sentatives, and have floated various
suggestions for overcoming the cur
rent crisis. One involved a proposal
for reducing the I 5,000-member Brit
ish military presence in Northern Ire
land as an inducement to the IRA to
disarm.
Another was reported to call for a
symbolic disposal of some weapons
by all paramilitary groups, Protestant
and Catholic, on a "day of reconcilia-
But Mandelson said he received no
commitment of IRA disarmament be
fore he acted on Friday.
Speaking before the new de
Chastelain report was announced, he
said the past week's discussions be
tween Sinn Fein and the Irish govern
ment had left "very unclear what the
position of the IRA is, what informa-
pilots' testing and retesting the
equipment, airline officials said.
"It may be that some pilots are be
ing overly cautious and are running
through their checks several more
times than they typically do with
their stabilizer," Jack Evans, an
Alaska Airlines spokesman, told The
Associated Press.
Boeing officials said that running
the electric motors that drive the sta
bilizer on the ground could lead to
overheating, which will trip a switch
in the cockpit. The motors will re
main inoperative until the switches
cool down again.
jackscrew assembly was in
spected.
During that check, the compo
nent failed a check that was done
to determine the amount of wear
on the jackscrew and the eight
inch gimbal nut though which it
traveled.
According to maintenance
records, the initial measurement
led mechanics to recommend re
placing the gimbal nut immedi
ately. However, further entries in
the maintenance log show that
the action "was re-evaluated and
the assembly was re-inspected"
the next day, the statement said.
The maintenance record
showed that the result of the sub
sequent inspection fell within
federally approved limits, and
that the assembly was rechecked
five time with the same results
before being signed off by an
Alaska Airlines maintenance in
spector.
tion they will provide to de Chastelain,
and what they are prepared to agree
with de Chastelain as to what he could
report."
In announcing the suspension,
Mandelson said: "We've got to clear
up this issue of decommissioning [dis
armament] once and for all. It has
dogged the process throughout. It has
sapped confidence in the institutions."
He said real progress had been made
but it was not sufficient. "I hope with
goodwill, and in a calm and measured
way, people will be able to build on
this progress" and resolve the crisis,
he said.
Trimble told reporters he met with
Sinn Fein's chief negotiator Martin
McGuinness on Friday, then had a
phone talk with Adams. "They had
nothing to put before me,' he said.
"Consequently, suspension became
inevitable."
He said he regretted suspension, but
"there can be no further place in the
politics of Northern Ireland for private
armies and their guns."
Shortly before Mandelson's an
nouncement, President Clinton said he
hoped a way could be found to keep
the peace process going. He said his
administration had been "heavily in
volved" in trying to break the dead
lock, and he hoped there would be no
"backslide" during the suspension.
During past crises, Clinton has sent
former Sen. George Mitchell to North
ern Ireland, and Mitchell succeeded in
steering the parties to agreements. But
Mandelson said Mitchell had advised
he did not want to return to Northern
Ireland.
That left open the question of who
will head a review of the peace pro
cess that will now be undertaken.