RAISINVILLE TOWNSHIP, Mich. - Investigators hope the orange metal flight data recorders found Friday afternoon will unlock the mystery of why Comair Flight 3272 went down Thursday afternoon in an icy field 45 miles southwest of Detroit, killing 29 people.
''As of now, we consider this a very open question as to what caused this accident,'' said John Hammerschmidt, a member of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) who briefed reporters Friday night in a township hall a few hundred yards from the crash site.
Mr. Hammerschmidt said NTSB investigators hope that the on-board recorders - which record physical data and cockpit conversations - are in good enough condition to be of use to investigators. The boxes were flown to NTSB headquarters in Washington, D.C., Friday night.
The discovery of the voice and data recorders was the first break in the crash investigation, which has been hampered by harsh winds, drifting snow and biting cold as investigators sift through the wreckage.
The crash created a crater in the field 4 feet deep and 25 feet wide. The debris was spread across a 100-by-200-yard area.
In addition to the flight recorders, investigators found the twin-engine aircraft's propellers and propeller bits, both engines, landing gear and flaps - all the major aircraft components, Mr. Hammerschmidt said.
When the 30-seat plane went down at 3:56 p.m. Thursday, the weather in the Monroe, Mich., area included light snow, and ''mostly light'' wind, Mr. Hammerschmidt said.
Federal investigators started their probe Friday by inspecting the crash site and setting into motion a nationwide search for information on the doomed Comair flight.
But officials of the National Transportation Safety Board said the removal of the dead must be completed before the wreckage can be examined in detail and an answer as to why the airplane, en route from Cincinnati to Detroit, suddenly plunged into the field and exploded into a fireball.
Mr. Hammerschmidt said the first priority is to remove the remains of the 29 persons who died on board the propeller-driven Embraer Brasilia 120 aircraft.
None of the bodies is intact and none of the remains had been identified Friday, Mr. Hammerschmidt said. ''There are remains all over the accident scene,'' he said.
Mr. Hammerschmidt said that because of the extreme cold - with heavy winds, drifting snow and a wind-chill factor well below zero - rescue workers were limited to brief shifts at the crash site before they had to come in for breaks.
Among the dead were one Cincinnatian, Dexter Adams of Paddock Hills; and the Northern Kentucky-based flight crew of Capt. Dann Carlsen, First Officer Kenneth Reece, and flight attendant Darinda Ogden Nilsen. Friday, Comair offered to fly relatives of the victims to Michigan.
Over the next several weeks, after the remains are removed from the site in sparsely populated Raisinville Township, 45 miles southwest of Detroit and 18 miles from the airport that was Flight 3272's destination, the NTSB's work will begin in earnest, including combing of the snow-covered empty field, as well as interviews in the Detroit area, Washington, D.C., and Erlanger, Ky., Comair's headquarters.
But even with the bodies and debris still flung across the field, teams of investigators were beginning their probe Friday morning.
The NTSB had a closed-door meeting Friday morning at a hotel in nearby Ann Arbor. The conference included representatives of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the Airline Pilots Association, Comair, the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, Hamilton-Standard, makers of the airplane's propellers and other companies involved in the aircraft's design.
Eleven NTSB investigators, plus about 43 other investigators, are involved in the probe, said Mr. Hammerschmidt. He said the investigators had divided into working groups.
The groups include:
- A ''main records'' group, set to arrive in Cincinnati on Monday, which will visit Comair's headquarters.
- A witness interview group, which will speak with eyewitnesses as well as with pilots who were on the same radio frequency at the time of the accident.
- A cockpit voice and data recorder group that will analyze the data from the cockpit equipment found Friday afternoon.
- A weather group, which will collect data from the National Weather Service's Michigan office in Pontiac.
Other groups will collect information on the flight crew's records, aircraft performance, the electronic and hydraulic systems, the engines, the wings, and radar data.
Mr. Hammerschmidt said NTSB investigators made substantial progress in interviewing witnesses Friday, one of whom told the NTSB that the plane appeared to be in a ''barrel roll'' before hitting the ground.
One witness, Mr. Hammerschmidt said, said the plane's engine was ''revving'' up to the moment of impact.
FAMILIES
CREW
MINISTER
SCENE
INVESTIGATION
TRAVELERS
COPING
INVESTORS
TODAY'S SUMMARY
FIRST-DAY COVERAGE Jan. 10, 1997
