Aircraft Accident Brief Ntsb/aab-02/01 (Pb2002-910401): Egypt Air Flight 990, Boeing 767-366er, Su-Gap - National Transportation Safety Board Page 68
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160 62
focusing on getting into his seat, troubleshooting the upset, and attempting to regain
control of the airplane—would have suspected at this point that the relief first officer’s
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actions were directly contributing to the airplane’s dive.
Rather, the captain likely would
have assumed that the relief first officer was also attempting to regain control of the
airplane and would work cooperatively with him.
As previously discussed, the relief first officer’s passive behavior in response to
the airplane’s nose-down movements and the captain’s questions is not consistent with
what would be expected from a pilot who was dealing with an unexpected or undesired
airplane problem. To the contrary, the timing of the increased nose-down elevator
movement and the corresponding decrease in load factor was consistent with the relief
first officer having increased the forward control column pressure when the captain
returned to the cockpit.
At 0150:15, as the airplane continued to descend rapidly in a 40° nose-down
attitude, the captain again asked, “What’s happening, [relief first officer’s first name]?
What’s happening?” Again, the relief first officer did not respond to the captain’s question.
Although the relief first officer remained unresponsive to the captain’s queries, there is no
specific evidence to indicate that the captain suspected at this point that the relief first
officer’s actions were causing the airplane’s dive.
At the same time, as the airplane was descending through about 27,300 feet msl,
both elevator surfaces began moving to reduced nose-down deflections. Shortly thereafter,
the airplane’s rate of descent began to decrease. Because there was no evidence that the
relief first officer had attempted to regain control of the airplane before this, the Safety
Board considers it likely that these movements were the result of nose-up flight control
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inputs made by the captain after he returned to the cockpit.
Six seconds later
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Although the CAM recorded all of the captain’s remarks, the “What’s happening? What’s
happening?” comments at 0150:06 were of a poorer recording quality and less audible than similar remarks
made at 0150:08 and 0150:15. The evidence from both microphones was consistent with the captain
speaking from outside the cockpit or the rear portion of the cockpit when he made the earlier statement and
from the forward portion of the cockpit when he made the later statements, suggesting that the captain was
moving forward as he made these statements. Further, the content and tone of the captain’s statements were
consistent with his trying to understand an unexpected situation upon his return to the cockpit.
When the captain asked, “What’s happening? What’s happening?” at 0150:06, his words were not
recorded by the hot microphone at the first officer’s position; however, the hot microphone recorded the
captain’s subsequent remarks until it stopped recording cockpit conversation at 0150:25. (None of the relief
first officer’s comments during the accident sequence were recorded by the hot microphone. For additional
information, see the section titled, “Audio Information Recorded by First Officer’s Hot Microphone.”)
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The Safety Board considers it likely that the captain never heard any of the relief first officer’s “I rely
on God” statements. None of these statements were recorded by the hot microphone at the first officer’s
position, suggesting that they were spoken very quietly. (By contrast, the hot microphone at the first officer’s
position did record the captain’s statements of “What’s happening?” as he moved to his seat at the forward
portion of the cockpit [at 0150:08] and again after he was seated in his seat [at 0150:15], despite the fact that
the captain was farther from that hot microphone.)
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The visual difference between pushing forward on the control column and pulling aft on the control
column to create elevator movements of the magnitude recorded on the FDR would not have been readily
apparent to the captain in the darkened cockpit during the unexplained crisis, especially when he was trying
to understand the many abnormal events and sensations that were occurring during the dive.
NTSB/AAB-02/01
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