by Leonard Berberi
French experts’ confidential report on flight MS804 Paris-Cairo in 2016 with 66 people on board: “Plane crashed in fire caused by oxygen leak”
EgyptAir flight MS804 Paris-Cairo crashed in the Mediterranean Sea on May 19, 2016 with 66 people on board due to a fire that broke out in the cockpit due to oxygen leaking from the co-pilot’s mask – switched and put into mode three days earlier “Emergency” – at the time when the Commander or First Officer was likely to be smoking at 11,278 meters above sea level. Six years after this disaster, some of the world’s leading experts are perhaps shedding light once and for all on what happened to the Airbus A320, which the Egyptian authorities – responsible for the investigation – have not published either a preliminary or a final report on. . A 134-page document, viewed exclusively by Corriere della Sera, now reconstructs the final moments. The file was sent a month ago to the Paris Court of Appeal, which is investigating “manslaughter” because 12 of the victims are compatriots.
The distance
Flight MS804 departs from Charles de Gaulle in Paris on May 18, 2016 at 11:21 p.m. At 00:11 the jet enters Italian airspace over Livigno, overflying Veneto, then circumnavigates the Balkans and heading south. At 2:27 a.m The Greek air traffic controller asks the pilots to get in touch with their Egyptian counterpart because the Airbus is entering the airspace of the African country, “but he does not get an answer,” writes the French investigation.At 2:34 a.m., the plane disappears from the radars of both area control centers, after turning first to the left, then immediately to the right and not raising an alarm, it turned out that just before sinking, the plane sent out seven “messages” in two seconds: they signaled problems with the anti -Ice sensors, the cockpit windows, they indicated the presence of smoke in the front bathroom and in the avionics compartment (below the cockpit), the interruption of the function betw e systems critical to flight and wings.
The investigations
On June 16 and 17, a month later, the two “black boxes” are recovered (one records the technical parameters of the flight, the other the audio of the pilots) and then sent to France to be examined by the Bea investigative agency will deliver the results – as specified by the rules – to those responsible for the investigation: Cairo. Relations with the Egyptians are problematic. The incident is an act of terrorism for them. Paris disagrees: the debris recovered around the impact area rules out the blast. In the fall of 2018, the French criminal police came to the Bea’s offices with an unprecedented act to collect the data of the “black boxes”. To create the current report, the experts met 23 times between August 2021 and February 2022. They noted that the pilots on board this plane tended to smoke a lot (which was not banned by EgyptAir at the time) and that in previous years traveling there the plane had several technical problems, “but none were so serious that on had to stay on the ground”.
The beginning of the tragedy
On May 16, 2016, EgyptAir’s maintenance worker replaced the co-pilot’s oxygen mask. It is also unclear why Egypt is not cooperating. When putting away the new mask, the operator leaves the cursor, which controls the airflow, in the «Emergency» position. According to the report, this is the beginning of the chain of events that led to the sinking: the Airbus manual states that in emergency mode “an oxygen leak may occur”. This happened on board flight MS804. To confirm this is the audio of the pilots.
The traces of oxygen
When separating the audio tracks of one of the black boxes, the “Cockpit Voice Recorder”, the experts discover two rustles at 2.25 and 24 seconds and at 2.25 and 29, which originate from the microphone built into the co-pilot’s oxygen mask. The moment is in his compartment . Then two more beats, at 2:26 and 11 and at 2:26 and 24. The oxygen itself is not combustible, but it promotes combustion. Because of this, a fire begins immediately after it, which is started “by a spark or flame”. The finger points to a lit cigarette, the umpteenth cigarette on this plane, if it is true that two months ago the ashtrays in the cockpit were replaced because they are now too worn. The document does not say whether the pilots used a fire extinguisher or not.
The planned controls
“When we enter the cockpit, between the various pre-takeoff checks, there is also the control of the oxygen flow in the side masks,” explains Corriere Daniele Veronelli, commander of the A320 and member of the technical department of Anpac (National Association of Commercial Pilots). “A door is raised and the airflow is tested by pressing a button that protrudes from the compartment. By activating the intercom, you can hear the flow of oxygen, since each mask is equipped with a microphone ». If the crew is the first to board the plane that day – he continues – “then that type of test is also carried out. If, on the other hand, you take over from colleagues, the test is not planned, but it doesn’t detract from the fact that this takes place anyway, it only takes a few seconds”.
The alarms
Are there signs of oxygen on board? “When the levels drop, the oxygen level indicator on one of the screens in front of the pilots turns orange. When you’re on the ground don’t take off, when you’re on the plane you have to decide whether to continue or divert to the next airport. The masks have an autonomy of at least 15 minutes. “There is a lever: if it is in the normal position, the oxygen flow is as required. On the other hand, when it is in the “emergency” position, it deflates at a higher pressure to expel the fumes that could penetrate in the event of a fire or smoke on board.
Pilot fatigue
In the document, among other things, there is a passage about pilots. Between 1:01 am and 1:46 am – when the plane flies by between the Croatian coast and Athens, Greece – the technicians, listening to the black boxes, notice that the commander and first officer are showing signs of fatigue. “At 1.01 and 53 seconds, a yawn can be clearly heard,” it says. Twelve minutes later, “pilot and co-pilot clearly express that they are both tired from this night flight and from lack of sleep.” The same concept is repeated at 1.46. But the documents collected, the experts explain, “show that the rest periods were respected for both”.
The reactions
The Egyptian civil aviation authorities and EgyptAir did not respond to the courier’s questions. Icao, the UN civil aviation authority, says it has not received any final reports from Cairo. Bea, the French detective agency, confirms the position expressed in 2018: for her, the most likely hypothesis remains “a fire that broke out in the cockpit during the cruise phase and led to the loss of control of the jet”. “Since May 2016, we’ve wanted to understand why we lost loved ones,” says Julie Heslouin over the phone, who lost her brother Quentin, 41, and father Pierre, 75, over the phone, who had long wanted the truth. This document might provide the answers.
April 26, 2022 (Modification April 26, 2022 | 07:13)
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