The drama unfolded in barely four minutes, behind closed doors in a cockpit flying over the intertropical convergence zone, also known as the “doldrums”. Four minutes in the heart of the night of 1is June 2009, during which the Rio-Paris flight AF 447 stalled, fell and sank in the waters of the Atlantic, off the Brazilian coast.
The 216 passengers and twelve crew members died instantly. Without even having been triggered on board the emergency instructions.
The accident of Air France flight 447 did not lengthen the list of mysterious disappearances in the history of aeronautics: the recordings of the black boxes, found two years after the accident, at a depth of 4,000 meters, provide information with precision the parameters of the device, as well as the conversations between the three pilots, in the moments preceding the impact. Thirteen years later, however, the Rio-Paris remains a tragedy without culprit.
The fulgurance of the crash contrasts with the slowness of the legal response. Since the initial indictment of Air France and Airbus – the company and the manufacturer of the plane – ten years of meandering instruction have passed. A dismissal will be pronounced in August 2019 by the Paris tribunal de grande instance, before being invalidated two years later by the investigating chamber, paving the way for the trial long awaited by the families of the victims, including there are 73 French nationals.
Parade of Experts
This Monday, October 10, it is in the main room of the Paris tribunal de grande instance, with the protocol reserved for “major trials” (two video transmission rooms, reinforced security, badges for the press, etc.), that Air France and Airbus are remanded to correctional for “manslaughter”.
The nine weeks of hearing, scheduled until December 8, promise a copious parade of aeronautical experts, but also forensic scientists, former pilots…
Above all, for the first time, the carrier and the aircraft manufacturer will be confronted with questions from the court and the lawyers for the civil parties. These represent 411 natural persons, from twenty-one countries, who recall the cosmopolitan population of the transatlantic flight, returning from Brazil after a honeymoon, a business meeting, a simple vacation…
They will have to project themselves into the night of the drama. Imagine, once again, the last hours of their loved ones. Return to this May 31, 2009, in Rio de Janeiro, Antonio-Carlos-Jobim international airport. Flight AF 447 took off at 10:29 p.m., skirted the coast of Brazil, reported its position to the Recife control center, before heading east, towards this area of turbulence saturated with cumulonimbus clouds. A storm certainly powerful, but not exceptional, in this famous “doldrums” so dreaded by sailors.
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