In the investigation of aircraft accidents, it is not uncommon for investigators to fight against each other, but it is not common.
Most of the planes in the air crash are not so smashed, and in many cases, they can even maintain the shape of the almost complete plane, and it is not difficult to put them back together. But for a plane like the Martha 123 that crashed into a mountain at high speed and finally fell to pieces, it is very difficult to piece it back together, which is visible to the naked eye.
However, Zhuo Huan was not joking.
The next day, the investigative team began rebuilding a skeletal model of the plane.
Airplanes are not puzzles, they can be pieced together piece by piece. Airplanes are 3D solid shapes. If you want to build a complete aircraft, you must first build a complete steel skeleton for it. Just like building a house requires laying the foundation, the investigation team spent three days and the painstaking efforts of more than 30 investigators and workers to finally complete the steel skeleton of the aircraft.
ATR's technicians also rushed to Schaffhausen at this time to provide technical support for the investigation team: no one knows their own aircraft better than them.
The great cause of fighting planes has been slowly unfolding, and it is destined not to be accomplished overnight.
On the other hand, Lina also found more than 100 passengers who had taken Martha flight 123 through the airport and airlines. She contacted these people on the Internet and offered to bear all travel expenses. In the end, more than 30 people agreed to come to Schaffhausen to be interviewed by the investigation team.
In the warehouse of the candy factory, the plane wreckage fragments that were once scattered all over the floor were all gathered aside at this moment, and replaced by a huge steel plane skeleton. It spans more than half of the warehouse and occupies the most central position of the warehouse. Dozens of investigators and technicians from the ATR company took the fragments, gestured on the skeleton of the plane, finally confirmed, and then pieced the wreckage together.
Lina came to the warehouse, she found Fu Cheng in the crowd, and waved to him.
Fu Cheng walked to the warehouse door, Lina said: "Five passengers have already arrived, Fu, I would like to invite you to conduct an interview with me."
Fucheng thought for a while: "Shouldn't you be called Mr. Shang Zhuo?"
Lina asked in surprise: "Do you think Reid is suitable for such an occasion?"
These words are well-founded, and Fu Cheng has no way to refute them. He put down his work and came to the office building of the candy factory with Lina.
Since the UAAG bought the candy factory, it has naturally become the investigation headquarters. The two came to the fourth floor, and there were five people sitting in the corridor, including men and women, old and young. Lina stepped forward and said a few words in German. Then she walked into the office with a young girl.
The door was gently closed, the girl sat opposite, Fu Cheng and Lina sat on the other side.
After entering the house, the girl looked around with curious eyes. Not everyone has ever flown on an airplane, and most of them will never have anything to do with an air crash in their lifetime, let alone contact with an airplane accident investigation team.
This is a spacious office with various materials and instruments in a mess. A whiteboard in the room was filled with red and black markers, including the names of people, Martha Airlines, and Martha 123. And next to these words are photos of the two pilots.
Lina turned on the voice recorder: "Hello, when did you take flight Martha 380?"
The girl immediately looked away, and she sat up straight: "Well, cough, I took this plane from Berlin to London a month ago..."
One morning, more than a dozen people came one after another.
Like passers-by in the world, they walked through the door of the office, left some faint impressions of Martha 380, and then left in a hurry.
By the evening, all thirty-six people had finished their interviews. After Fucheng sorted out the interview materials, he heard the clicking sound of the chair legs moving, and he turned his head to look. I saw Lina standing in front of the whiteboard, looking up at the blond young man with a bright smile.
She held the recording pen tightly in her hand, and stared at her friend's carefree smile. Hot tears filled her eyes and finally burst out. She quickly covered her mouth with her hand, not letting the crying escape from her fingers.
Fucheng's lips moved, and he was about to speak to comfort, Lina: "Leave me alone, Fu."
Fu Cheng was silent: "Lina, my condolences."
Staring at the best friend on the whiteboard, Lina said hoarsely: "He never told me that his work is so hard. He never said..." The crying could no longer be restrained, and it vented from her throat.
Lina cried bitterly, and Fucheng walked out of the office with the interview materials, leaving a quiet space for her.
Inside the door is the desperate and broken cry of women, and outside the door is a depressing silence.
Fucheng closed the door, he turned around, and his movements suddenly stopped.
After a while, Fucheng said softly: "Mr. Zhuo, when did you come?"
The setting sun slanted into the room through the window at the end of the corridor, and fell on the concrete floor, giving off a warm radiance. A man in a thin coat stood leaning against the wall with his hands in his pockets and his head slightly lowered. The mouth seemed to be chewing gum, and the lips rose and fell with the chewing motion.
"It's only been five minutes." After a pause, Zhuo Huan looked at him: "How's the interview going?"
Fucheng was silent for a moment, and handed the information in his hand to the other party.
Zhuo Huan took it and glanced roughly. With a sneer from his nasal cavity, he handed the materials back to Fucheng, turned and left: "Let's go, go back and fight for the plane."
Fu Cheng hesitated for a while, but still stepped up to follow.
Under the sunlight, the two walked side by side and left the quiet corridor.
That information was placed in the database of the investigation headquarters by Fucheng, and when all the truth came out and the investigation report was written, they would also be included in it.
Six hours ago, in the office, the girl said this in English—
"I was a little late when I boarded the plane. As soon as I sat down firmly, the co-pilot went into the cabin to explain and demonstrate the use of seat belts. This is a low-cost airline. Of course, there is no LED display screen like other large planes, so this kind of safety reminder It’s all up to people to say it with their mouths. But it’s the first time I’ve ever seen a pilot do something like this, so it’s very impressive.”
The old man said this in German—
"I was the first one on the plane, maybe I went a little early, and I saw the captain repairing the chair. He was surprised to see me, and quickly explained to me that there was nothing wrong with the chair, but a screw was loose. Twist it."
While recalling, the boy said—
"I went back to the plane because I forgot something. I saw the captain and co-pilot dismantling the seats. I was so surprised, they helped me find my lost bag. As I was leaving, I turned around and saw them Still tearing down the chairs with a screwdriver. Why are you tearing down the chairs? Are those chairs too old to be replaced?"
In the dead silent office, Fucheng looked at the puzzled young man.
"...Yes, because those chairs are too old, so they have to be replaced."
Why take apart the chair
Because after seeing off the last group of passengers, they will act as cargo plane pilots to deliver goods.
Therefore, removing the chairs as much as possible can leave more space for loading goods, which can increase the transportation profit a little. This is an airline requirement. After seeing off the guests every day, all the more than forty seats are removed and moved to the luggage compartment. Arrive two hours earlier in the early morning of the next day and install the seats back one by one.
Day after day, repeating the same thing.
This is what Léon Lorraine and Gerard Truffaut do every day.
At eight o'clock in the evening, everyone was continuing to fight for planes in the warehouse. Lina walked into the warehouse with red eyes, she called Gao Yun out and said something. When Gao Yun came back, Fu Cheng asked him, "What did Lina tell you?"
Gao Yun's expression was not very good, he sighed: "Lina told me that the EASA headquarters has made a conclusion and imposed a certain warning and punishment on Martha Airlines. But Fu, there is no other punishment. Since Martha Airlines can cooperate with Leather bag company cooperates and fabricates a Martha 123 flight out of thin air, so there must be legal consultation. Their actions must be completely legal, and no one can sanction them. So Lina asked me just now, based on European aviation law. Is this the only way... I told her, yes, unfortunately, this is the end."
Speaking of this, Gao Yun showed a wry smile: "After I immigrated, sometimes I think the Western system is very good, and sometimes I think it is extremely ridiculous. The law always serves class members, and this class is something we can't get over in this lifetime. If this incident happened in China, at least Marsa Airlines would not be so unscathed, and there is not even a person who needs to be held accountable.”
Naturally, Fucheng couldn't answer this answer.
Two days later, Su Fei returned to Schaffhausen with the repaired black box data.
"The black box was a little damaged when the plane crashed into a mountain and exploded, but the problem was not serious, so it was basically repaired. When I was at the ATR headquarters in France, I had separated the flight data and cockpit call records, and separated five audio tracks. Shall we look at the flight data first, or listen to the call log first?"
Su Fei didn't know that Zhuo Huan had denied the cause of the air crash as pilot error. It may be the cause, but it is definitely not the main cause.
Zhuo Huan stood beside the big screen: "Look at the flight data."
Su Fei: "OK!"
The punk teenager's fingers crackled and tapped on the keyboard, and soon, the complete flight data curve was projected on the big screen.
The flight data curve of the aircraft black box includes many parameters such as the aircraft's pitch attitude, roll attitude, and lateral overload. ATR72 is an old aircraft produced in the 1980s, so its black box records very few parameters, only 11 records.
If it is a movie, the investigators will definitely check carefully from the first second recorded by the black box to find out whether there is any abnormality. Yet this is reality.
Almost the next second after the flight data curve was projected on the big screen, four or five voices sounded at the same time—
"Rolling posture?!"
Fu Cheng stood up, walked to the big screen, and carefully looked at the data of the rolling posture. After a while, he turned around and looked at Zhuo Huan: "I have never seen such roll data. In fact, even military fighter jets seldom perform such high-risk rolls during exercises. Civil airliners It is absolutely impossible to artificially make such a tumbling action."
Gao Yun immediately asked a question: "Yesterday, the investigator and I have completely inspected the right engine, and it is confirmed that there is no abnormality in the right engine. Now the black box data also shows that it is not an engine problem, and the engine was intact until the crash. Then this What's the matter with this strange rolling posture?"
Zhuo Huan rubbed his jaw, his voice was low: "Is there something wrong with the hydraulic system?"
ATR-72, using a traditional hydraulic system.
Pilots control the aircraft through hydraulic systems. The hydraulic system is equivalent to the blood vessels of the aircraft, which transport blood (command by the pilot) to every cell of the aircraft. If there is a problem with the hydraulic system, the pilot cannot control the aircraft at all, and a crash is an inevitable outcome.
Fucheng suddenly thought, "Could it be a special downdraft? According to the weather on the day Martha 123 crashed, there was a thundercloud 20 kilometers east of Zurich Airport. Although the route of Martha 123 did not pass through that cloud Thundercloud, but maybe under special circumstances, it affected the flight of the plane?"
Gao Yun followed Fucheng's words and thought: "You mean, once the downdraft affected the roll attitude of the plane, the plane rolled over. First, because the plane just took off and the altitude was not high enough, the pilot had no time to adjust; , These two pilots are indeed too young, inexperienced, and their flying skills are average. Coupled with long hours of work, they were tired of driving, unable to respond well, and were in a hurry, so that caused the plane to crash into the mountain?"
Fu Cheng turned to look at Zhuo Huan: "Mr. Zhuo, what do you think?"
Zhuo Huan stood in front of the big screen, his eyes were fixed on the roll data curve of the plane.
After a long time, he said: "There are many possibilities. Fucheng, you go to check the weather and meteorological data of the day, and you must confirm whether the thunderclouds of the day have produced downdrafts, and whether they can affect the flight of the aircraft twenty kilometers away. "
Fu Cheng nodded: "Okay."
"As for the others..."
Gao Yun and the others suddenly became nervous.
Zhuo Huan: "Finish the plane first."
Everyone: "..."
As if he didn't notice the almost condensed resentment behind him, Uncle Zhuo was extremely calm, and he said to Su Fei: "Listen to the cockpit call log."
Because of this sentence, the originally noisy office suddenly fell silent.
Everyone held their breath, waiting to hear what the two pilots had said before the crash, and what warnings the plane had given.
Ten minutes later, Zhuo Huan closed his eyes, and announced in a calm voice: "The cockpit call records are not useful for reference, and are not used as investigation materials for the time being."
No one questioned his words, because the two pilots said almost nothing meaningful during the entire 13-minute conversation. Except for the final near-desperate cry and the helpless roar that frantically tried to correct the plane's attitude back to a horizontal state, there was only a sound of "NO".
no, no, no...
The last words of every plane crash victim are always strikingly similar.
There is no memory of past events in life, and no rational analysis of the cause of the accident. When the cloud and mist broke through and they saw the mountain wall that was close at hand, all they could think of and blurt out was this sound of no.
this is the truth.
brutal reality.
***
On October 18, 2020, Gerard Truffaut's body was airlifted back to Toulouse, France for burial.
Sixteen days have passed since the air crash.
The Internet's short memory. When the accident just happened, netizens learned that the co-pilot in the air crash turned out to be the heir of the Truffaut Group, and all social media exploded. The most popular TAG on Twitter that day was "Truffaut". However, as time passed, gradually, everyone no longer remembered the air crash.
Until today, sixteen days later, at the funeral of Gérard Truffaut, people were reminded of this incident again.
On the Internet, countless people left messages "RIP" in silence for the poor victims.
Toulouse, beside the South Canal, people in black dresses stood quietly beside the cemetery, watching the black coffin being lifted up by four young people, carried into the cemetery, and put away gently. They were former friends of Gerald. When he was not kicked out of the Truffaut family, they often met and played together.
It's not that Mrs. Truffaut never thought of finding her son's current friends to carry the coffin for him. However, when she went to find her son, she found that her son, whom she had loved for more than 20 years, had no time to make friends because of his busy work. His only friend was Leon Lorraine, and the two were now in deep sleep together.
The pastor read the eulogy softly, paying homage to this young and lonely soul.
Under the bright sunshine, everyone closed their eyes, listening to the soft condolences.
When everything was over, when the four friends picked up the shovel and piled the soil on the coffin piece by piece, the soil sealed the last color of the coffin. Finally, Mrs. Truffaut couldn't help crying in despair. In his arms, weeping uncontrollably.
Lina was wearing a black dress. She stood in the center of the crowd, watching from a distance.
"May he rest in peace in heaven."
"Amen."
Following the pastor's words, everyone closed their eyes and prayed for the deceased to rest in peace: "Amen."
The funeral was handed over to the butler. The butler of the Truffaut family, with red eyes, replaced the sad Mrs. Truffaut and Mr. Truffaut who needed to comfort his wife, and sent these guests away.
Lina walked in front of the sad couple, Mr. Truffaut still had a straight face. There were tears in his eyes, but he didn't let them flow out of his eyes. He raised his head to look at the young blonde in front of him, and said in a dull voice, "Stephanie."
"Uncle Truffaut." Lina said.
The Truffaut family and the Comte family are family friends, or, until five years ago, they were very close friends. Until Gerard, the heir of the Truffaut family, suddenly said that he wanted to be a pilot and was unwilling to join the family group, the relationship between the two families was cracked.
Mr. Truffaut said coldly: "I still remember Gerald telling me about you five years ago. It was you who made him fall in love with airplanes. I never thought that when you were young and played with model airplanes, he would actually It would lead to a career as a pilot. And it turns out he didn't have the talent to be a pilot at all."
Lina couldn't help interrupting him, she didn't dare to reply: "Geral is gone, can you not be so cruel!"
"Oh? Then what did I say wrong again. This sentence is said by that kid Patrick, isn't it? I heard him say that Gerald is not a good pilot. He didn't do anything when the plane crashed. The most reasonable and correct choice, all he did was panic."
Lina: "Under such circumstances, as a young pilot, what can he do? Can you calmly look at death, and then successfully control a plane that suddenly loses control?"
"Stephanie, you..."
"I didn't come to quarrel with you." Lina rudely interrupted Mr. Truffaut, causing the latter's face to sink. But she didn't care at all: "I'm here to give you the last cockpit voice recorded by the black box." Then, she took out a USB flash drive from her bag, "It doesn't matter if you don't want it, this is Jella Last words before he died. Don't worry, he didn't say a word to you. He has no energy to care about anything other than flying. After all, as you said, he is a pilot with no talent, rubbish, and he can't even take care of flying the plane. How can he have time to do other things and think about other things."
Mr. Truffaut's face was livid, he snorted coldly, and did not reach out to take the USB flash drive.
Mrs. Truffaut took the USB flash drive: "Thank you, Lina."
Hearing Mrs. Truffaut calling out her nickname, Lina's stubborn and angry expression gradually eased. She nodded slightly to the Truffauts, turned and left. Halfway through, she turned around suddenly and said to Mr. Truffaut: "Did you see that sheep hidden in the box?"
Mr. Truffaut froze for a moment, he raised his head and looked at Lina blankly.
Looking at his expression, Lina knew the answer. She gritted her teeth, and finally couldn't help but said: "There is one thing you said wrong. Gerald likes airplanes, never because of me. Yes, I gave him many airplane models. Fly factory and have seen a lot of airplanes. But those are because he likes airplanes, I will take him there. I always treat him like a brother, he hides a sheep in the box, but I really feel sorry for him, For so many years, no one has ever seen that sheep."
Lina looked at Mrs. Truffaut who looked astonished again: "Have you seen it? You haven't seen it either."
After finishing speaking, leaving the Truffaut couple at a loss, Lina closed her eyes, turned around and left with big strides.
Back in the car, she took out a tissue to wipe the tears from the corners of her eyes.
"I cried for you again. Today's eye makeup is not waterproof. If you see that my eyes are dizzy, you will definitely say that I love to cry again."
"Geral..." the voice stopped abruptly.
Covering her lips, Lina cried bitterly in the back seat of the car.
Back in Schaffhausen and got out of the car, Lina has already wiped away her tears. Before walking into the investigation headquarters, she took out her mobile phone and found "Geral" in the address book. Looking at the name steadily, she smiled slowly and sent a message.
[The sun is as bright as your hair today.]
[There is no haze.]
[It is the best sunny day.]
[Good night, little prince.]
***
"At night, when you look at the sky, I live in one of the stars. Since I am laughing on one of the stars, it will seem to you that all the stars are laughing, and all the stars you will see will be laughing stars. 』
-"little Prince"