“It is a relief for the families of victims”reacted on Thursday February 10 on franceinfo Maître Sébastien Busy, lawyer for the association Entraide et Solidarité AF 447 and the families of the victims, while Airbus and Air France will be tried for “involuntary homicides” from October 10 to December 8 in Paris , 13 years after the crash of the flight between Rio de Janeiro and Paris which killed 228 people in 2009.
After the crash, “first of all there was a long period of searching for the device to find the black boxes, the flight recorders, then there was a whole series of expertise”relates Maître Sébastien Busy. “There was after a dispute over an expert report, a dismissal order, an appeal, to finally arrive at this reversal of the dismissal order.” On August 26, justice finally decided to refer the company and the European aircraft manufacturer to the criminal court.
During the trial, in the fall, the civil parties “will have the opportunity to ask questions to Air France, to Airbus, to try to understand what really happened that evening and to highlight the responsibilities”, explains the lawyer. Families of victims “are impatient and await the opening of this trial but they are also dreading it because it will be two complicated months.”
“We will have to hear things that they do not necessarily want to hear about what happened, about what the passengers may have felt. But they need to hear the explanations from Airbus and ‘Air France.”
Maître Sébastien Busy, lawyer for the association Entraide et Solidarité AF 447 and the families of the victimsat franceinfo
The civil parties’ questions relate in particular to the action of Airbus and Air France in the face of the problem of “Icing of the Pitot probes”the problem causing “any series of device malfunctions”according to Maître Sébastien Busy. “Without this icing of the Pitot probes, there is no accident. However, Airbus had known for several months that, on this type of Pitot probe, there was clearly a weakness and recurrent icing. Air France also knew it Nobody did anything (…) Why this immobility?asks the lawyer.