Ten years after the tragedy of the Rio-Paris flight, Airbus and Air France are dismissed

On 1 June 2009, flight AF447 fell into the Atlantic Ocean after taking off from Rio de Janeiro. The 228 pbadengers and crew members, from 34 different nationalities, died in the accident, the worst in the history of Air France.

The element that triggered the incident is the freezing of the sensors on the outside of the device.Pitot probes, which had erroneous indications of speed and disoriented pilots, until the aircraft fell into the ocean.

In this investigation, which began more than ten years ago, the two companies were indicted in 2011 for "manslaughter".

In their 189-page memorandum, signed on August 29, which AFP was able to consult, judges Nicolas Aubertin and Fabienne Bernard estimated that the incident was due "to a combination of factors that had never occurred before and which thus revealed dangers that could not be perceived before".

The investigations, which sought to determine whether it was possible to attribute indirect liability for this accident to the airline or the manufacturer, "did not lead to characterizing an unlawful failure of Airbus or Air France to (…) errors in driving (…) that caused the accident, "they continue.

Mutual Aid and Solidarity AF447, the main badociation of relatives of the victims, will appeal this opinion, considered contempt, said his lawyer, Alain Jakubowicz, to AFP.

"How not to think that this decision is guided by economic interests superior to those of justice?", denounced in a statement the collective.

The Paris prosecutor 's office had asked the judges for a lawsuit against Air France and a dismissal from Airbus.

The prosecution found that the airline had been "negligent" in failing to provide its pilots with sufficient information to react in the event of an anomaly in the sensors controlling the speed of the aircraft, despite several incidents of this. type in the months. before the incident.

Contacted by AFP, Olivier Morice, a lawyer for several families of victims, said that he was "surprised" for the decision and announced its intention to appeal.

From the beginning of the investigation, experts compete for responsibility in the series of incidents that led to the accident. The civil parties believe that the two companies, Air France and Airbus, must answer in court.

A first report in 2012 pointed to crew failures, technical problems and lack of information from pilots in the event of a Pitot probe freeze, despite previous incidents reported to the Airbus manufacturer.

After this initial investigation, the aircraft manufacturer requested a new badessment indicating that the crew had reacted "inappropriately".

But the parents of the victims and the airline challenged this claim that they considered the builder too supportive of the Paris Court of Appeal. This one ordered the cancellation of it and reopened the investigation.

A final report, dated December 2017, estimated that "unsuitable actions in manual flying" The crew brought the French Airbus A330 company to throw itself into the sea.

In order to convince the judges to bring to justice Airbus and Air France, the relatives of the victims presented to the French courts a report on August 8th that showed, according to them, that Airbus had known since 2004 the problems of its probes that control the speed of their planes.