Report Of The Royal Commission To Inquire Into The Crash On Mount Erebus, Antarctica Of A DC10 Aircraft Operated By Air New Zealand Limited (1981) Presented to the House of Representatives by Command of the Governor-General.
The Mount Erebus disaster occurred on 28 November 1979 when Air New Zealand Flight 901 (TE-901)[nb 1] flew into Mount Erebus on Ross Island, Antarctica, killing all 237 passengers and 20 crew on board. Air New Zealand had been operating scheduled Antarctic sightseeing flights since 1977. This flight was supposed to leave Auckland Airport in the morning and spend a few hours flying over the Antarctic continent, before returning to Auckland in the evening via Christchurch.
The initial investigation concluded the accident was caused primarily by pilot error, but public outcry led to the establishment of a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the crash. The commission, presided over by Justice Peter Mahon QC, concluded that the accident was primarily caused by a correction made to the coordinates of the flight path the night before the disaster, coupled with a failure to inform the flight crew of the change, with the result that the aircraft, instead of being directed by computer down McMurdo Sound (as the crew had been led to believe), was instead rerouted to a path toward Mount Erebus. Justice Mahon's report accused Air New Zealand of presenting "an orchestrated litany of lies", and this led to changes in senior management at the airline. The Privy Council later ruled that the finding of a conspiracy was a breach of natural justice and not supported by the evidence.
The accident is the deadliest accident in the history of Air New Zealand and one of New Zealand's deadliest peacetime disasters.
Contains Several Photographs of the Disaster area.
- Soft Cover
- 167 Pages
- In Good Condition
