Passenger Safety First

The results of the National Committee on Transportation Safety (KNKT) investigation into the AirAsia QZ9501 crash have uncovered the cause of the accident that killed all 162 passengers and crew. Last week, KNKT Chairman Soerjanto Tjahjono announced that the cause of the crash was human error.

He cited five major factors that triggered the crash almost all of them pointing to mechanical failure. The factors were a malfunctoning rudder travel limiter (RTL) or a system to control the plane's turns, insufficient maintenance and problem analysis, indications of pilot error in reporting procecures when the RTL malfunctioned, an unconnected cable in the flight augmentation computer and the pilot's manual control of the aircraft.