Aircraft Accident Brief Ntsb/aab-02/01 (Pb2002-910401): Egypt Air Flight 990, Boeing 767-366er, Su-Gap - National Transportation Safety Board Page 120
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160 Boeing Commercial Aircraft Company (Boeing) to evaluate design changes as the terminating
action for the repetitive inspection of the bellcrank assembly on the Boeing 767. In January
2001, the Egyptian Team submitted a detailed report to the NTSB docket which outlined several
technical inaccuracies in the accident submission that was made by Boeing. Finally, the
Egyptian Team submitted numerous comments, reports and letters to the NTSB accident docket
related to various aspects of the accident investigation and its factual record. The full record of
Egyptian participation in the investigation serves as the foundation for the following comments.
I.
The NTSB’s Investigation Was Marked By Procedural
Irregularities and the Failure to Follow Accepted Accident
Investigation Standards
The investigation of the EgyptAir 990 accident was marked by early and ongoing “leaks”
of information from the NTSB, and by public statements of the NTSB Chairman and “other
sources close to the investigation.” The early release of information, especially relating to the
cockpit voice recorder (CVR) and the flight data recorder (FDR) and the statements by the
NTSB Chairman and other NTSB officials, established in the minds of the media, the public, and
the aviation industry that the accident was caused by a deliberate act of the First Officer. This
became the so-called “suicide theory.”
The release of selected CVR and FDR data, and the NTSB’s public discussion of it as
purportedly reflecting a deliberate act, occurred in November 1999, less than two days after the
recorders had been recovered. Furthermore, the announcement by the NTSB that it was
considering turning the investigation over to the FBI came after an incorrect translation of the
conversations on the CVR which were in Arabic. CVR information was also released before
there was any investigation by a CVR working group. Standard NTSB procedure is to convene a
CVR working group, made up of representatives of the various parties, which then develops a
transcript of the cockpit conversation, based on the technical and cultural knowledge of the
group members. This did not occur. Instead, the NTSB staff listened to the Arabic
conversations, accepted the incorrect translation of a non-Egyptian American translator,
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