TRANSASIA PILOTS UNDERGO SKILLS TESTING AFTER CRASH

TAIPEI: All 71 pilots who operate Transasia Airways’ ATR propeller-jets began proficiency tests yesterday, three days after one of the carrier’s ATRs crashed into a river killing at least 39 people.

The airline said it had cancelled 90 flights over the next three days to accommodate the requirement by Taiwan’s Civil Aeronautics Administration that the ATR pilots be retested.

Preliminary investigations indicate the pilots of Wednesday’s doomed flight shut off a running engine after the plane’s other engine went idle. Experts say the move was an error. “It’s a mistake,” said John Cox, a former US Airways pilot and now head of a safety consulting company. “There are procedures that pilots go through — safeguards — when you’re going to shut down an engine, particularly close to the ground. Why that didn’t occur here, I don’t know.”

Local prosecutors have said they will be looking into the possibility of “professional error”.

Thomas Wang, head of Taiwan’s Aviation Safety Council, said that it was too early to reach conclusions about any pilot error.

Pratt & Whitney Canada, the plane’s engine maker, and the safety council have begun to examine both of the aircraft’s engines, a process that can take four months, Mr Wang said.

The crash into the muddy Keelung River in Taipei minutes after takeoff killed at least 39 people, with rescuers recovering four more bodies yesterday, according to the Taipei City Fire Department. Four more remain missing.

One of the bodies was in a Trans Asia Airways uniform and it was soon identified as a 26-year-old female crew member, Yeh Jia-jing.