Judical inquiry ordered into crash

PARIS, JULY 27: French investigators finished decoding the second black box on Friday on the Concorde supersonic jet that crashed and kill...

PARIS, JULY 27: French investigators finished decoding the second black box on Friday on the Concorde supersonic jet that crashed and killed 113 people, but it could take up to three days to complete the analysis of the fatal flight, the French Transport Ministry said.

The ministry said there were 600 bits of technical information on the recovered flight data recorder that had to be analysed and then compared with information decoded earlier from the other black box.

In another development, the French prosecutor8217;s office opened a judicial inquiry into quot;involuntary homicide and involuntary injuryquot; relating to the accident, sources said on condition of anonymity.

Involuntary homicide in France is defined as a negligent killing punishable by up to three years in prison, or US 43,000 fine. The three judges in the case have the legal right to call witnesses to determine the circumstances of the accident.

Meanwhile, French authorities were preparing the Madeleine church in central Paris for a memorial service later on Friday in honour of the victims. The church, which resembles a Greek temple, is one of the most famous in Paris.

Raymond Auffray, an engineer and aeronautics expert to Paris8217; Court of Appeal, told the daily La Croix that technical investigations should focus on turbine discs inside both engines on the left wing, including the Number No 2 engine that caught fire shortly before takeoff in the accident on Thursday.

The pilot8217;s loss of control of the aircraft points towards a ruptured quot;turbine diskquot; which he said would cause the engine to completely destruct. The risk of such a rupture in normal circumstances is low 8211; less than one in a billion for each hour of flight, so he didn8217;t exclude the possibility of quot;intruding objectsquot; in the engine.

Story continues below this ad

Another daily Liberation reported that experts believed the number two motor was quot;without doubt the cause of the disasterquot;. However, Le Figaro, reported that investigators were not ruling out the possibility of human error. Liberation cited Andre Turcat, a long time supersonic pilot, as saying the decision of the pilot of the ill-fated Concorde to head towards Le Bourget Airport 2.5 km away instead of returning to Charle de Gaulle where it took off was quot;imaginable but riskyquot;.

Captain Christian Marty tried to wrestle his stricken jet down on the airport as a fiery blaze was consuming the left side of the plane, said Elisabeth Senot, the prosecutor in charge of the judicial investigation.

France8217;s Transportation Minister Jean-Claud Gayssot said he hopes to authorize his country8217;s Concordes to resume their supersonic flights in the next few days.