Helios Airways Crash - Press Articles

International Herald Tribune, "Cockpit Confusion Found in Crash of Cypriot Plane"

          The crew members of a Cypriot airliner that crashed Aug. 14 near Athens became confused by a series of alarms as the plane climbed, failing to recognize that the cabin was not pressurizing until they grew mentally disoriented because of lack of oxygen and lost consciousness, according to several people connected with the investigation into the crash.
          Complicating the cockpit confusion, neither the German pilot nor the young, inexperienced Cypriot co-pilot could speak the same language fluently, and each had difficulty understanding the other's English, the worldwide language of air traffic control.
          A total of 121 people were killed in the crash after the plane climbed and flew on autopilot, circling near Athens until one engine stopped running because of a lack of fuel. The sudden imbalance of power, with only one engine operating, caused the autopilot to disengage and the plane to begin to fall.
          So far, the Greek authorities have hinted at oxygen problems but have not announced the full findings of investigators.
          The people interviewed for this article agreed to speak only on the condition that they not be identified because none are official spokesmen for the investigation and because of political sensitivities arising from a Cypriot plane's crashing in Greece.
          Investigators pieced together the story of the crash from many sources. In the wreckage, they found the first solid clues: the pressurization valve and an air outflow valve set incorrectly. Air traffic control tapes provided information on the confusion in the cockpit.
          The plane had a sophisticated new flight data recorder that provided a wealth of information. There were maintenance records from the night before, and investigators interviewed the mechanics who worked on the plane.
          Among other things, the investigators determined that the pilot was not in his seat because he was up trying to solve a problem that turned out to be one of the lesser threats facing the plane.
          The plane that crashed, a Boeing 737-300, underwent maintenance the night before. The maintenance crew apparently left a pressurization controller rotary knob out of place, according to the officials connected to the investigation, and the crew did not catch the mistake during preflight checks the next day. This meant that the plane could not pressurize properly.
          At 10,000 feet, an alarm went off to warn the crew that the plane would not pressurize. Crew members mistakenly thought that the alarm horn was a warning to tell them that their controls were not set properly for takeoff, the officials said.
          The same horn is used for both conditions, although it will sound for takeoff configuration only while the plane is still on the ground.
          The climb continued on autopilot. At 14,000 feet, oxygen masks deployed as designed, and a master caution light illuminated in the cockpit. Another alarm sounded at about the same time on an unrelated matter, warning that there was insufficient cooling air in the compartment housing avionics equipment.
          The radio tapes showed that this created tremendous confusion in the cockpit. Normally an aircraft cabin is held at 8,000 feet pressure, so the crew at over 14,000 feet would already be experiencing some disorientation because of a lack of oxygen.
          During this time, the captain and co-pilot discovered that they had no common language and that their English was not good enough for the complicated technical conversation required to fix the problem.
          The crew members called the maintenance base in Cyprus and were told that the circuit breaker to turn off the loud new alarm was in a cabinet behind the captain. The captain got up from his seat to look for the circuit breaker, apparently ignoring the confused co-pilot.
          As the plane continued to climb on autopilot, the air grew so thin that the crew became seriously impaired. The captain lost consciousness first on the floor of the cockpit, followed by the co-pilot, who remained in his seat, according to the officials.
          The autopilot did as it was programmed to do, flying the plane at 34,000 feet to Athens and entering a holding pattern. It remained in a long circling pattern, shadowed by Greek military jets, until fuel ran low and one engine quit.
          Boeing, the maker of the plane, issued a notice shortly after the crash to airlines that it would revise flight crew training manuals to emphasize to crews that they must understand how the various warning systems work and what to do about them.
          The notice emphasizes that the takeoff configuration warning horn will not sound under any circumstances after the plane has left the ground.
          The same horn will then be used only for a cabin altitude warning. The company notice said there had been other instances of confusion over the horn by pilots.
          "Confusion between the cabin altitude warning horn and the takeoff configuration warning horn can be resolved if the crew remembers that the takeoff configuration warning horn is only armed when the airplane is on the ground," the notice said. "If this horn is activated in flight, it indicates that the cabin altitude has reached 10,000 feet."

Cyprus Weekly, "Aviation Law Expert Nigel Taylor Talks to Cyprus Weekly About Air Disasters and the Recent Greek Helios Crash"

          Legal specialists from Britain and the United States who work with a large American law firm specializing in airplane accidents were in Cyprus this week in the wake of the recent air disaster and asked to speak to the Cyprus Weekly about the purpose of their visit.

          The interview was held in the light of a recent announcement by the Cyprus Bar Association advising the relatives of victims to be cautious about being approached by foreign lawyers on the matter of compensation claims. The legal specialists said they were aware of the Bar announcement and stressed they had not made any direct contact with the victims' relatives, neither did they anticipate doing so.
          Here is the full text of the interview.

Flight International, "Helios 737 crashed with no fuel"

           Speaking exclusively to Flight International, head of the Greek Air Accident Investigation and Aviation Safety Board Capt Akrivos Tsolakis has revealed that the Helios Airways Boeing 737-300 crashed north east of Athens soon after it ran out of fuel while being flown by a student pilot whose flying experience was “a few hours in a Cessna”.
          The co-pilot was unconscious and the captain was not on the flight deck, Tsolakis confirms.
          The flight crew's unconsciousness is believed to be related to malfunctioning of the aircraft’s air conditioning and pressurisation systems. Tsolakis says he is worried at what he is finding in the engineering records of the aircraft, which had required air conditioning system rectification five times in less than two months, leading Helios engineers to question the aircraft’s fitness to fly.
           It was only 4min 50s into the flight before the crew reported an air conditioning malfunction, Tsolakis reveals, but they kept climbing. Passing through 14,000ft, the cabin altitude warning alert activated and it was not cancelled.
          Tsolakis says the remains of three people, who were known to be on board, have not yet been identified. One of them is the captain.

ERT.gr (Hellenic Broadcast Corporation), "Key Witness: New Evidence on Air Tragedy"

           The British pilot who had flew the fatal Helios airliner on August 7, a week prior to the air tragedy, is expected to shed light to the causes of the crash. Cypriot top-selling O Fileleftheros said that the British pilot had reported major problems in the air-conditioning and cabin pressure, while smokes had been reported. Whether the problems had been recorded in the plane’s logbook or not as well as which checks had been conducted or whether the presumable procedures were taken remain be answered by the experts. In the meantime, Air Accidents Investigation Committee President Akrivos Tsolakis is on his way to Cyprus. At the same time, tests on the identified bodies are still in progress. So far, 55 bodies have been identified. On his part, Cypriot President Tassos Papadopoulos met with two EU experts that arrived on Cyprus on Tuesday night. Mr Papadopoulos requested they make the best of their knowledge and experience so that the causes of the air tragedy are brought to surface.

ERT.gr (Hellenic Broadcast Corporation), "Alarm System Malfunction"

          According to information, Air Accidents Investigation Committee experts, who are investigating the causes of the accident, located a significant problem with the alarm sound system. As per the first data, the same sound signal was heard for various malfunctions, a fact which may have confused the pilots over the airliner’s actual problem. The Public Prosecutor’s Office was immediately informed on the new findings, as according to international regulations, experts are obliged to report such evidence to the manufacturing company and the air carrier in charge. At the same time, investigations focus on the frequency used by the airliner to contact the Control Tower. According to information, the first indications show the airplane was never on the Athens Control Tower frequency and remained on Nicosia frequency throughout the flight. In the meantime, it was made known that flight attendant Andreas Prodromou’s body was identified via DNA test. Cypriot President Tassos Papadopoulos dismissed the political parties’ proposals on an independent investigation into the causes of the tragedy. He also dismissed the possibility of political responsibilities claiming that they will trigger nothing but confusion.

Bloomberg, "Helios Jet Crashed After Fuel Loss Followed Pressure Drop'"

         The Helios Airways plane that crashed Aug. 14 near Athens came down when fuel ran out, possibly after a loss of pressure incapacitated crew and passengers, an investigator said.
         ``The plane's engines stopped functioning when fuel ran out, which was the final cause of the crash,'' the head of investigations Akrivos Tsolakis said today in a letter to Greek Transport Minister Michalis Liapis, released by e-mail from the transport ministry today.
          The crash killed all 121 people on board. Greek air controllers couldn't establish contact with the Boeing Co. 737-300 which was flying from Larnaca, Cyprus, to Athens. The pilots of two F-16 fighter planes sent to investigate saw that the co-pilot had collapsed in the cockpit and there was no sign of the pilot.
          ``There is evidence that there was a technical anomaly in the aircraft's compression system,'' Tsolakis said in the letter. If this occurred, it would ``affect the physical condition of crew and passengers,'' Tsolakis said.
          A ``distressed or weakened'' man took the pilot's seat in the last 10 minutes of the flight and tried to send an SOS, without success, Tsolakis said in the report.
          Investigators are awaiting more evidence, such as toxicological analysis results, depositions and data from the airplane's maintenance record, the letter said.
          The Helios airplane suffered a loss of pressure last December and was taken out of service for inspection and repair, the airline and its former technical manager said after the accident.
          The low-cost airline, based in Larnaca, said the December incident was the only one it has had on its aircraft.

BBC News, "Greek crash 'kills all on board'"

          An investigation has begun into Greece's worst ever air crash, in which all 121 people on board a Cypriot airliner are feared to have died.
          The jet hit a hill near Athens after the pilots apparently fell unconscious after a drop in cabin pressure.
          Greek F-16 fighter jets were scrambled when contact with the Helios Airways plane was lost during the flight between Larnaca in Cyprus and Athens.
          A Greek investigator said one of the plane's black boxes had been recovered.
          Akrivos Tsolakis of the Greek Air Accident Investigating Committee told BBC World TV that the flight data recorder had been found but they were still looking for the cockpit voice recorder.
          The Boeing 737 plane, carrying 115 passengers and six crew, came down at 1220 local time (0920 GMT). An airline official said most of the passengers were Cypriot, including some 48 youngsters on a trip to Prague, where the plane was due to fly after a stopover in Athens.
          Lieff Global is investigation the Helios Airways crash.