Page 3 - Tail Strike News Today

Intelligence, a cell phone conversation saying, the deed is done, we dont know what the intelligence is other than they have some piece of evidence. >> i gather its not the latter, not someone saying the deed is done, but we dont know what the difference is. but it itself, neither of these two streams, neither the forensics, nor the intelligence are conclusive. but when you put them together, they believe that theres growing indications that it was a bomb. but they cant conclude what brought the...

What we would call a catastrophic fire engine failure type of situation, it would be possible it could have caught to the rest of the airplane and caused this heat sensing device to, you know, activate. but, you know, at this point its really anybodys game. you can look at various, at various other aspects. would the heat have been noticed had the airplane just broken apart for what were talking about in the tail strike? you know, thats a hard thing. this is 14 years after that tail strike occur...

Kate? >> thanks so much. i want to bring in tom costello. other officials talking to andrea mitchell saying its likely, but premature to say that this was a bomb. what do you know about what investigators would be looking at at this point? >> well, one thing that has drawn their attention from the beginning is the fact that the tail section of this plane, as weve said before, landed a good three miles or so from the rest of the plane. so was the tail section torn off, as a result of an explosion...

I know the british have long and dope ties. and at any rate it is plur py. the crew through there was a problem. >> i dont know to me at least with what little evidence they have. something was certainly up. and we dont know what it was. we have seen a number of government saying ah we better not fly over the sinai anymore. we are going back to the ukraine accident before with the malaysian airplane. suddenly after the horses are out in the barn. we better not go there. and it makes me wonder wh...

After a number of years, you know, there was a failure. >> reporter: the cause traced back more than seven years when the planes tail scraped the ground on landing. the repairs were not done properly. the plane eventually ripped away from the plane mid-flight and then there was this doomed 747 that broke apart in the air. investigators say metal around the repair work weakened and eventually caused a catastrophic structural failure. since 1982, 31 planes operated have had tail strikes. >> a tail...

Could have affected those stringer ares and reconstruction. >> the stringers are the structural feature of the there we see the wings that are, they went to the ground largely intact, but the tail section was found three miles from most of the wreckage. they are talking about a tail strike in 2001 when this strike. they can scrape the tail end of the plane and put pressure on the fuselage before the wheels hit. this airline said repairs were made by air bus and everything looked fine.

>> thank you. >> fox news alert, all of that is happening in çówashington, hf a world away there are new questions about a crash of a russian jet in egypt. there is no way a missile strike is to blame, but there was an explosion that caused the plane to break apart in midair. the question is, what was it? we have a retired pilot and aviation consultant. you have floun all over the world and seen number of accidents. when you look at facts on the ground what are your thoughts. >> i see a aircra...

Failure. tail strikes do happen and typically theyre followed up with a very thorough inspection, x-rays of the fuselage to make sure theres not ongoing hidden cracks within the fuselage. in this case, there was significant damage, actually visual damage that had to be repaired on the fuselage itself, which is the encapsulating structure. in this case, of course, it is 100% speculation on my part at this point. other than previous examples. previous examples would be aloha airlines. they had a f...

Ntsb, but none have crashed. >> a tail strike or any sort of damage to the aircraft can cause a problem. it may not be immediate problem. it may take years for the problem to develop. >> from the mangled debris field of flight 9268 investigators will have to piece together whether an incident 14 years ago brought down this plane, something more sinister or a problem with the plane or pilot previously unknown. still do come in the newsroom. right now ohio voters are deciding whether or not to l...

Just what happened to this a321. despite the damage, the plane was repaired. >> if its done properly and done by a mechanic thats experienced and the procedure is followed, it shouldnt be an issue. >> reporter: airbus vigorously tests its planes for such a possibility. >> we go beyond the limit by putting the tail on the ground and slowly accelerate. >> reporter: for the tests, the planes are equipped with a special skid to prevent damage, shown in this airbus flight material. >> if its too hars...