Spanair-victims demand closure of local aviation accidents board (CIAIAC)
On Saturday 20th of May, victims of Spanair Flight JK5022 marched for the second time in Las Palmas, Spain, demanding justice for the 154 mortal victims of the crash, which occurred in Madrid on August 20th 2008.
“154 dead and no one guilty,” read a banner of the Victims Organization AVJK5022 whose members wore skyblue t-shirts and marched for the second time, after years of neglect from the Spanish authorities.
In Spain the board for civil aviation accidents (CIAIAC), depends directly from the Ministry of Public Works, in charge of Transportation and Infrastructure in Spain and has been suspected of benefiting big companies instead of the interests of common civilians.
The accident of Spanair Flight JK5022 in Barajas Madrid was caused by a defective Take-Off Warning System (TOWS) on the McDonnel Douglas 82 probably because of a defective Circuit Breaker and a design faults of no-redundancy on the McDonnel Douglas (now Boeing). The CIAIAC itself was already warned by specialist about the problems on the MD-planes after an earlier incident in 2007 but failed to take any action.
However, although McDonnel Douglas and (now bankrupt) Spanair had been sued by the victim organization, a Spanish Provincial Court decided in 2012 that the pilots (who died in the crash) were to blame for the disaster and classified the case. Spanair, the Spanish airport operator AENA and Mc Donnel Douglas were all let of the hook.
The only ones who were investigated were the Spanair-mechanics Felipe García y José Antonio Viñuelas, who dispatched the fateful flight on August 2009. Nobody of Spanair, MCDonnel Douglas, nor any AENA’s executives were convicted or fined for the irregularities.
The family’s organization AVJK5022 now demands a different investigation body of aircraft accidents then CIAIAC, who wrote an illegible report of 92 pages (A-032/2008) four years after the accident. “We demand the creation of independent investigation body of civil air accidents in Spain,” the AVJK5022 spokesman declared on Saturday. “We want an institution that conducts objective investigations and guarantees the citizens’ safety.”
The Spanir victims organization also demanded that the investigation into Flight JK5002 be reopened and counts with the institutional support of several municipalities in the Canary Islands, where the plane was heading and home of many of the crash victims.
The current minister of Infrastructure and head of the controversial Spanish investigation body CIAIAC, is Iñigo de la Serna.
