- vor 22 Stunden
On 21 January 2019, a light aircraft breaks up in mid-air and crashes into the English Channel off Alderney in the Channel Islands during a flight from Nantes, France, to Cardiff, Wales. Argentine soccer player Emiliano Sala and pilot David Ibbotson are both killed.
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00:00Above the English Channel, a Piper Malibu suddenly disappears from radar.
00:09Where did you go?
00:11November 264, Delta Bravo. Do you read?
00:14Search teams find no trace of the plane or its high-profile passenger.
00:19Tonight, Emiliano Sala is missing.
00:23This began as a small general aviation accident,
00:26and it very quickly became of worldwide interest.
00:29As recovery crews search the sea, the pilot's background is investigated.
00:34He didn't have a full instrument rating.
00:36That rang alarm bells for me.
00:38But when they locate the plane, theories change.
00:42Look at the bending of the splice joint.
00:45The plane broke up before it hit the water.
00:48So now what we had to establish was, why did the aircraft break up in flight?
00:54A chartered Piper Malibu is moments from takeoff.
01:09Pilot David Ibbotson prepares the plane for departure from Nantes Airport in France.
01:26November 264, Delta Bravo. Ready for takeoff.
01:30Ibbotson has a VIP on board.
01:34Argentinian footballer Emiliano Sala.
01:37Hola, hermanitoes. Como andan loquitos locos.
01:45Que ya voy saliendo para Cardiff loco.
01:46Si mañana la tarde arrancamos de entrenar muchachos.
01:50En mi nuevo equipo.
01:53The star striker is leaving Nantes for good.
01:58He's moving up to the Premier League to play for Cardiff City Football Club for 17 million euros.
02:04This was the move up to one of the world's richest leagues seen around the globe.
02:10It would have propelled him to absolute superstardom.
02:16It's a two-hour flight from Nantes to Cardiff, Wales, crossing over the English Channel.
02:23This is Emiliano Sala's second flight with Ibbotson.
02:26Two days earlier, he flew back from Cardiff where he signed his new contract.
02:31Emiliano wanted to go back to Nantes to be able to say proper goodbyes to his teammates, to his friends.
02:37He left in the middle of the night and hadn't really told them that he would be signing for Cardiff City.
02:43November 264, Delta Bravo, requesting clearance to climb to flight level 55.
02:48November 264, Delta Bravo, you are cleared to flight level 55.
02:53The Piper Malibu can carry five passengers, but tonight Emiliano Sala is travelling alone.
02:59Are you warm enough?
03:02Sorry?
03:04Are you warm?
03:06It's a comfortable aircraft, it will cruise at a reasonable speed.
03:16It's quite large, it's quite fast for a light aircraft.
03:19The plane climbs towards a cruising altitude of 5,500 feet.
03:24It would have been relatively easy to conduct this flight back from Nantes to Cardiff in clear weather.
03:30As they approach the Channel Islands, the weather changes.
03:36Rain clouds loom on the horizon.
03:39The pilot's visibility would have deteriorated as he approached the cloud conditions over the Channel Islands.
03:47November 264, Delta Bravo.
03:51With conditions worsening, David Ibbotson contacts air traffic control.
03:56Requesting clearance to descend to maintain VMC.
04:00November 264, Delta Bravo, you are cleared to flight level 50.
04:04Just advise if you need further descent.
04:07November 264, Delta Bravo, thank you, sir.
04:10Ibbotson takes the Piper lower to avoid the bad weather.
04:15The cloud layers would have obscured what little light was available from the islands of Jersey and Guernsey.
04:21And the forward visibility would have been such that the horizon would have been indistinct and difficult to make out.
04:28Are you good back there?
04:31November 264, Delta Bravo, requesting further descent to maintain VMC.
04:43But ten minutes later, Ibbotson still hasn't been able to clear the clouds.
04:48Clear to descend at your discretion.
04:51Roger.
04:53The Piper Malibu is one hour from Cardiff.
05:00But as the controller follows the plane's progress, it disappears from radar.
05:07November 264, Delta Bravo, how are you making out there?
05:13Where did you go?
05:15November 264, Delta Bravo, do you read?
05:21Uh, yes, I've got a Piper Malibu missing from radar near the Channel Islands, north of Guernsey.
05:35Registration number is November 264, Delta Bravo.
05:40News of the missing Piper spreads quickly.
05:46Word starts to emerge that a Piper Malibu has gone down in the Channel, um, and fairly soon afterwards, sports journalists start saying,
05:55wasn't Emiliano Salah due to travel to Cardiff the same night?
05:59An air and sea search gets underway for a plane that disappeared over the English Channel.
06:04Search and rescue teams launch an expansive search of the Channel overnight and into the next morning.
06:10But the plane remains lost.
06:16Good morning.
06:17Hello.
06:18Meanwhile, a team from Britain's AAIB, or Air Accidents Investigation Branch, is assigned to the case.
06:27Radar data's come in. Check your inbox.
06:31Great, I'll bring it up.
06:33They wonder exactly where the Piper went down in the English Channel.
06:38We contacted ATC and we asked for the radar information, and we used that radar information.
06:44We were able to put together to provide a, uh, a track of the aircraft.
06:48Looks like the last known radar hit is right here, so it should be close to here.
07:00Investigators begin to zero in on a search area north-northwest of the island of Guernsey.
07:07These are deep waters. It's too deep for divers.
07:11And strong currents. I'll get the coordinates to the marine team.
07:16When we first started looking at the radar information and trying to turn that into a location in the sea,
07:23our marine advisors looked at tides, and that gave us a seabed location which we had reasonably good confidence in.
07:29While search and rescue teams begin more targeted efforts, the world gets the news everyone feared.
07:38Emiliano Sala was on board.
07:41French police confirmed to news outlets that Emiliano Sala was on the missing Piper Malibu.
07:48Given the temperature of the water and the weather conditions, it was very rough last night.
07:54Their chances of survival are very, very slim.
07:57In Nunnt, more affection for a much-loved player.
08:02We ask you to stand with us, to be united, and to respect the family. They refuse to grieve and continue to believe.
08:15Let us grieve. Let everything you can find. Okay. Thank you.
08:21I've got a team working on securing any mobile messages sent by the pilot or seller.
08:27Good idea. Okay.
08:30As the search continues, investigators look for any clues as to why the Piper Malibu went missing.
08:37You see, he deviates a bit to the right as he approaches Guernsey, but he's pretty much right back on course not long after.
08:46And the altitude holds steady at 5,000 feet during that time. Nothing too unusual.
08:53All right. But zoom in towards the end of the flight.
08:57Right.
09:04Check out those turns.
09:06They discover the plane made a wide turn to the right three minutes before it disappeared, followed by a hard left.
09:17Look at that final right turn.
09:20It's almost 180 degrees.
09:25The Piper then made a sharp right turn seconds before vanishing from radar.
09:31So we could see from the radar track that things began to go very strangely.
09:36There was a lot of turning, both left and right, and it culminated in a very sharp turn to the right.
09:41What would cause such erratic deviations ending in a steep dive?
09:46The behavior that we were seeing, which was an increasing turn rate and an increasing rate of descent, looked like the beginning of a maneuver that we call a spiral dive.
09:55Look at the altitude fluctuations.
09:59Up and down and then a very rapid descent.
10:04For the final few moments of that flight, this is a plane that is ascending, that is descending, that is meandering, and ultimately this plane is going to end up in the sea.
10:16Did the plane suffer a loss of control before plunging into the English Channel?
10:25Even if we do find the plane, it's still going to prove to be quite challenging.
10:29There's no CVR or FDR on the Malibu.
10:34Not having a flight data recorder or a cockpit voice recorder makes it incredibly difficult to establish what happened in the last few minutes of that flight.
10:42After three days, the search for survivors is called off.
10:46The world mourns the loss of an up-and-coming footballer.
10:50Messages of condolence flood in from football clubs and players who pay tribute to Emiliano Sala.
10:58While families grieve, recovery teams deploy ships equipped with side-scan sonar, hunting for the Piper Malibu at the bottom of the English Channel.
11:07But finding the wreckage 22 miles off the coast of Guernsey is slow going.
11:12There were high tidal flows, and it was further complicated by the winter storms that were coming through.
11:18Pressure is on the AAIB to find the wreckage.
11:22This starts as a small story about a plane going missing, and then suddenly there is somebody famous on board,
11:30and the whole world wants to find out exactly what's happened here.
11:34So, this sector looks clear. Okay, let's move on.
11:44Thirteen days into the investigation, search teams continue to scour the bottom of the English Channel,
11:50looking for the missing Piper Malibu, its pilot, and its sole passenger, footballer Emiliano Sala.
11:57We knew it was going to be very difficult, and at that stage, we didn't expect to actually find it.
12:04Hey, I've got something. You won't believe it.
12:12What is it?
12:13What is it?
12:14A message Sala left before takeoff.
12:20I'm going to go to Cardiff, crazy.
12:25Yes, we'll start training tomorrow, guys, in my new team.
12:32So, in the few moments before the plane took off, Emiliano Sala sent a voice note to his friends back home in Argentina.
12:41I'm already here, at the top of the plane, and it seems to be a piece.
12:46You know, if in one hour you don't have my new news,
12:49I don't know if they're going to send me to find someone, because they won't find me.
12:53So, you know, I'm afraid I have.
12:57Investigators discover that Emiliano Sala raised concerns prior to takeoff.
13:03Was there some kind of mechanical problem with the plane?
13:07That's a good point.
13:09I'll check the maintenance history.
13:12We looked to see whether the aircraft was maintained properly,
13:15and whether there's any hint there that there could have been some form of mechanical failure.
13:19Last full check within November.
13:22So, two months before the flight?
13:25Well, it's only flown 11 hours since then.
13:29As far as general maintenance is concerned, the plane checks out.
13:32When we looked at those records, we found they were all in order,
13:35and it wasn't suggesting that there should have been any sort of mechanical failure.
13:40Go check it out. That looks promising.
13:43Fifteen days into the investigation, search teams make a critical discovery.
13:49I bet that's our plane.
13:52Finding the aircraft was a big breakthrough for the investigation.
13:56Thanks. No, that's great. Thanks for the update.
14:01Not only did they locate the plane, but they found one of the bodies.
14:08Emiliano Sala's body is found inside the plane.
14:12His remains are sent to a pathologist for analysis.
14:15The pilot's body isn't found.
14:18A-A-I-B investigators turned their attention to video footage taken of the debris at the bottom of the English Channel.
14:25Pause it. On the forward section of the fuselage.
14:31Was the plane out of control when it hit the water?
14:36Look at the damage to the roof.
14:39One of the most interesting things about the wreckage was that all the compression damage was on the top surfaces, not on the lower surfaces.
14:49So what this showed us was that the aircraft had hit the sea upside down. That is, in an inverted attitude.
14:56Let's check the tail for damage as well.
14:59I didn't see it in the earlier footage.
15:11That's missing.
15:12Hmm.
15:13They didn't find it.
15:14The outer section of the left wing is gone too.
15:17Actually, for both wings.
15:19We did try and find them.
15:21We had the Coast Guard was looking for them and we were hoping that they might be washed up somewhere, but they never appeared.
15:26It's hard to know when these pieces separated.
15:30Did the tail and outer wings break off before or on impact?
15:35Look at the bending of the splice joint.
15:38Check out the direction of the bending.
15:41A close examination of the left wing provides a vital clue.
15:46We could see that the left wing failed as a result of the outer section being bent downwards.
15:54That can only mean one thing.
15:56The plane broke up before it hit the water.
16:00The finding that the left wing failed bending downwards was very significant.
16:06Because if the tail failed in flight, the aircraft nose would pitch down, causing the wing to fail bending downwards.
16:15Investigators conclude that the in-flight breakup began when the tail broke off, causing the wings to bend downwards, ripping off their outer portion before impact.
16:25So now what we had to establish was why did the aircraft break up in flight?
16:30Let's try modeling the radar data.
16:34We used a software simulation where you enter the radar information that we had and it uses aircraft laws of motion to give us information about the airspeed, the angle of bank, and the shield force on the aircraft.
16:50Okay, let's take a look.
16:55Using the plane's altitude and coordinates over time, investigators are able to plot the plane's maneuvers.
17:02Okay, so this is the plane's last turn starting at 2016.
17:09They examine the most mystifying maneuver, the final dive towards the water.
17:14The plane starts at 190 knots and continues speeding up to almost 280 knots.
17:21That's well beyond the structural limits of the plane.
17:25The team discovers that the excessive airspeed led to the aircraft's mid-flight breakup.
17:31Aircraft have maximum speeds beyond which you must not take them, because if you take them above those speeds, then you risk structural damage to the aircraft.
17:40And in this case, we saw the aircraft go way above those speeds.
17:44Why was the pilot flying so fast?
17:47Why does he make all those turns?
17:50My immediate thoughts on seeing that turn was it was extreme, and there was clearly something very wrong going on in the aircraft at the time.
17:58Investigators receive Emiliano Sala's toxicology report.
18:06Could the results shed any light on the mysterious crash of the Piper Malibu?
18:13When we receive the results of the post-mortem, we rely on the pathologist to indicate to us if there's anything that's abnormal.
18:20There's nothing unusual in Sala's toxicology.
18:23All right, then. Let's bring up the weather report.
18:27Right.
18:28The team turns to the weather data towards the end of the flight in hopes of explaining why the Piper Malibu lost control.
18:36Well, that doesn't look good.
18:38Rain. Lot of it.
18:42Hmm.
18:43It looks like he's turning as he's approaching those cells.
18:48Maybe he's trying to fly around the clouds.
18:52When you're flying at night with very little light, there are lots of ways in which your body can become confused about where you are in space.
19:00Are you climbing or descending? Are you turning left or right? And that can quite easily lead to a loss of control.
19:05So, tell me about the flight.
19:08Investigators speak with the air traffic controller.
19:13Uh, everything seemed totally normal. Then he just disappeared off the radar.
19:18And before you lost him, did you hear anything unusual?
19:25Not really. He did ask to descend twice to stay in visual conditions.
19:33November 264 Delta Bravo. Requesting further descent to maintain VMC.
19:39Clear to descend at your discretion.
19:41Uh, roger.
19:43Not only was the pilot trying to fly around the clouds, he was trying to descend below them for better visibility.
19:50You know, here's what I don't get. The pilot has instruments to help him fly through poor visibility.
20:00Well, he's clearly not using them.
20:04Perhaps he doesn't know how to use them.
20:10What do we have on this pilot? Let's figure out exactly who's flying this plane.
20:17We had a pilot that had maneuvered, we think, to avoid weather, but appears to have lost control.
20:23So that raised a question about why did that happen?
20:30And here it is. His current private license. It has all his ratings.
20:36Did the pilot have the required experience to fly the plane in bad weather?
20:42The family were able to share his laptop with us.
20:44And on there was a photograph he'd taken of his license.
20:49He didn't have a full instrument rating.
20:52He also had what's called an instrument rating restricted.
20:55So that's a limited instrument rating that allowed him to operate in some conditions in instrument flight rules.
21:01Plus, he hasn't flown using his instruments in almost two years.
21:09We hadn't had any recent practice in flying the aircraft in cloud or on instruments.
21:15And instrument flying is a perishable skill. You forget it quite quickly.
21:19Oh, that's not the worst part. The flight plan he filed for had a nighttime departure. He doesn't have a night rating.
21:28From our evidence of Mr. Ibbotson's recent flying, it was all done in daytime in good weather.
21:35Investigators conclude that Ibbotson's licensing was inadequate for a night flight in instrument conditions.
21:44Oh, there's something more.
21:50Every turn we took seemed to open a lot more cans of worms that we needed to investigate.
21:56Check this out.
21:58It's a summary of Ibbotson's projected expenses.
22:02Exactly.
22:04And look here.
22:06Pilot fee.
22:07That rang alarm bells for me because this guy is only a private pilot's license holder. He's not entitled to be paid.
22:17November 264 Delta Bravo, ready for takeoff.
22:20He didn't have a night rating and he didn't have a commercial pilot's license.
22:26Essentially means that this pilot should not have been operating this flight.
22:29So, who paid him?
22:36Who contracted an inadequately licensed pilot to fly Emiliano Sala to Cardiff?
22:43Getting to the bottom of who organized this flight was very difficult.
22:48There was no contract. There were no receipts. There was no agreements.
22:53This was all done by word of mouth or telephone.
22:56It's a wall of silence.
23:01They get very little information about the flight from the owner of the Piper Malibu.
23:06Oh, I've got a tip.
23:07Hmm?
23:09Someone wants to talk.
23:11Discreetly.
23:14Let's talk to them.
23:17Is this the break investigators need?
23:19David Henderson arranged the flight. He works for the owner.
23:28Investigators meet with a witness who has more information about Emiliano Sala's flight over the English Channel.
23:34The witnesses that came forward wanted to give us information but didn't want to be identified.
23:44The informant provides insight into the accident aircraft and its operator.
23:49So, Henderson hired the pilot?
23:57That's right.
23:59Okay.
24:01Ibbotson here?
24:03They learned that David Henderson keeps a roster of pilots.
24:06Mr. Henderson, how are you?
24:09David Ibbotson was one of them.
24:11Henderson asked Ibbotson if he could fly a passenger from Cardiff to Nantes and back again.
24:16I think I can do that.
24:20Mr. Ibbotson would have known that he had no night rating.
24:24And he would have known as a private pilot's license holder that he was not entitled to be paid for the flight.
24:29What is the departure time from Nantes?
24:33Investigators uncover more about the flight's schedule.
24:37So, the original plan for the flight was for Mr. Sala to fly back on Monday morning.
24:42Circumstances changed. The flight to Cardiff kept getting delayed.
24:54Mr. Henderson in Ibbotson again.
24:56There were numerous changes to the departure time over the weekend.
25:00Uh, sorry to say we have a further delay.
25:03That was pushed back at the request of the passenger.
25:06So, he was supposed to be flying in conditions of good visibility during the day.
25:11But that changed.
25:13And he doesn't have his night rating.
25:17Have you seen anything like this before?
25:19This is a first.
25:21What we started to see a picture of was an operation in the shadow.
25:27It was unlicensed.
25:30It had no approval to do commercial work.
25:33They were using an unqualified pilot.
25:36We have to figure this out.
25:38Work your contacts.
25:40Let's see what we can find.
25:43Are chartered flights with unlicensed pilots common?
25:46It was very challenging to assess the extent that this was going on.
25:52There's no records kept.
25:54There's no flight plans made.
25:56And witnesses are understandably reluctant to talk about it.
25:59Investigators learn about flights that aren't properly licensed, called grey charters.
26:04They offer a discounted price, which comes with increased risk.
26:09The problem with grey charters is that the aircraft that are being used to operate them are often not maintained to the same safety standard as commercial airliners.
26:18Witnesses came to us to talk about the prevalence of grey charters.
26:23We could see a pattern emerging of how common this was in aviation in the UK.
26:28Four months after the crash of the Piper Malibu, investigators are close to releasing a final report.
26:34When the case takes an unexpected turn.
26:40Oh, it's from the pathologist.
26:43He did some additional testing on Salah's blood work.
26:49Oh, he just sent me the analysis.
26:57Salah had carbon monoxide in his system.
27:00The pathologist had ordered toxicology tests, but that had not included carbon monoxide.
27:06And when he realized he'd missed that, he put in a request for just the carbon monoxide to be tested.
27:12This had really been a story about a pilot flying outside of his competency in weather that he'd neither practiced nor prepared for.
27:22And it was all down to him.
27:25The onus was being put on him.
27:26And then suddenly we get this finding of carbon monoxide.
27:31And that really made everyone think again.
27:34Salah's carbon monoxide levels were at 58%.
27:37Toxicology testing reveals that footballer Emiliano Salah had high levels of carbon monoxide in his system.
27:45I was shocked by the level of carbon monoxide that was in his blood.
27:49What would that have done to him?
27:51What would that have done to him?
28:01Carbon monoxide over 50%.
28:04Unconsciousness and eventual death.
28:07Eventual death.
28:12Salah was out.
28:14He wouldn't have been conscious when the plane crashed.
28:17Are you warm?
28:19Thank God for you.
28:23Carbon monoxide is a colorless, odorless, flavorless gas.
28:28You don't know it's there.
28:30You don't know you're breathing it in.
28:32And yet it's so dangerous and it can kill you quickly.
28:35Even low levels of carbon monoxide are dangerous.
28:39Are you good back there?
28:41The first thing that happens is you get a headache.
28:44You might feel confused, drowsy.
28:46You start not being able to do tasks that you would normally find easy.
28:49The question is, did Salah's carbon monoxide poisoning come from the plane or somewhere else?
28:58Right.
29:00Did Emiliano Salah show signs of carbon monoxide poisoning prior to his flight on the Piper Malibu?
29:08The AAIB seeks help from French investigators.
29:11We had our colleagues in France talk to people at Nantes Airport to see what the behavior of the pilot and the passenger had been as they were going through the airport on the way to the airplane.
29:25Well, how did the passenger seem?
29:29Officials at Nantes Airport scrutinized security footage of Salah to see if there was anything abnormal about his actions.
29:36What about the pilot?
29:42Okay. No. That... It's great. Thanks.
29:49Negative.
29:52Salah seemed fine. The pilot was alert. He wasn't swaying.
29:58That means the carbon monoxide poisoning was from the plane.
30:02David Ibbotson's body was never recovered from the English Channel.
30:07His carbon monoxide levels couldn't be determined.
30:12You know, maybe the modeling data will shed some light.
30:19Investigators returned to the flight path data for further insight.
30:24Was the pilot affected by the poisonous gas?
30:26Straight... level... looks like it's on autopilot.
30:36Hmm.
30:37It's hard to know if he was conscious or not.
30:39Next, the plane turns right, and then turns left.
30:43Look at these bank angles.
30:4636 degrees to the right, and then 56 degrees to the left.
30:52Those angles are well beyond the limits of the autopilot.
30:58Investigators discovered that the pilot was conscious enough to be turning the plane in the final stage of flight.
31:04But was he conscious during the last minute of flight?
31:08Then, here, the plane is in its dive, with its right wing pointed right down straight at the water.
31:16It's hard to believe he was fully conscious for that.
31:18Yes.
31:22Oh. Oh, check this out.
31:24Before the plane broke up, the wings almost level out.
31:28Either the pilot could have applied pressure on the control column, for example, by slumping over it, and that could have caused the wings to roll level.
31:37Check out the pitch.
31:40There's a slight increase.
31:43In the final moments, the pitch of the Piper Malibu starts to rise.
31:48It's evidence that the pilot must have been partly conscious.
31:51But for the aircraft to start to pitch up, the pilot would have to be conscious enough to pull the control column rearward.
32:00His carbon and oxide levels had to be lower than the passengers.
32:04He may have been conscious, but he still could have been badly impaired.
32:09May have been slipping in and out of consciousness, and may have made a token effort to recover the aircraft from the steep descending turn.
32:16Without Mr. Ibbotson's body, it's impossible to know how much he was affected by carbon monoxide.
32:24But we know they were sitting in the same combined cabin.
32:28Okay. We need everything there is on the Piper Malibu exhaust and ventilation system.
32:35And the carbon monoxide is carried by the exhaust gases which are generated by the engine.
32:40We needed to understand how do those exhaust gases get into the cabin.
32:43Are you warm?
32:46Then go for you.
32:52I've pulled the schematics.
32:55Great.
32:56Investigators study the exhaust and ventilation systems of the Piper Malibu to determine how carbon monoxide could have entered the cabin.
33:04Maybe there was an exhaust leak that seeped through the firewall and the pressure bulkhead.
33:17Maybe, but only if there was a crack or a leak.
33:22Piston engines produce high concentrations of carbon monoxide that can potentially enter the cabin as a result of cracks, holes or poorly fitted components in the exhaust system.
33:34The team did a lot of work on potential sources for the carbon monoxide in the cabin and we talked to the manufacturer and we talked to the engine manufacturer.
33:46Seals in the firewall and the forward pressure bulkhead form an airtight barrier preventing engine fumes from entering the cabin.
33:54Here's the thing, maintenance inspected the firewall and the pressure bulkhead two months ago. There's no signs of cracking or broken seals.
34:06During the last maintenance inspections, the engineers found nothing wrong with the firewall or the pressure bulkhead.
34:15Investigators consider a different possibility.
34:18What if there was a puncture in the exhaust piping?
34:24Did a breach in the exhaust system allow poisonous fumes to mix with the fresh air used to ventilate the cabin?
34:34As fresh air enters the aircraft, it's warmed by the engine's exhaust pipe inside a chamber called the heater muff before circulating into the cabin.
34:46What if the puncture happened after the last inspection?
34:51Let's check the log books.
34:54They look for any history of an issue near the tailpipe.
34:59No, nothing here.
35:01What about on the flight over to Nantes?
35:07That's a good point.
35:09Maybe something happened there.
35:11On the way to Nantes, Mr. Ibbotson did encounter a number of problems with the aircraft that he reported to various parties.
35:22Sounds like there were some issues on the flight on the way over from Cardiff.
35:25Like what?
35:27Oh, there was a small oil leak.
35:30And during the landing, his brakes gave him problems.
35:34Both were checked and they weren't a safety concern.
35:37Okay.
35:38This one is more troublesome.
35:39He reported a bang mid-flight.
35:43A cabin filled with mist.
35:46Two days before the fatal flight, Ibbotson piloted Emiliano Sala from Cardiff to Nantes to pick up his belongings and say his goodbyes.
35:55What the?
35:56He's okay?
35:57Oh, yeah, yeah.
35:58It's okay.
35:59The plane is mid-channel.
36:00He talks about a bang, something that really kind of grabbed his attention.
36:04He checks to see if everything is working as it should do, plane keeps flying, but in the back of his mind is what on earth was that?
36:22Navy, the turbocharger failed on the way over to Nantes and punctured the tailpipe.
36:35Did a turbine inside an engine turbocharger break, puncturing the exhaust pipe, allowing poisonous gas into the cabin?
36:45If you do have damage to the tailpipe, then there is a possibility that exhaust fumes and the carbon monoxide can flow into the fresh air and into the cabin.
36:57Interesting theory. I've got an idea.
37:00Investigators check with the National Transportation Safety Board in the United States, where the Piper Malibu is manufactured.
37:09Oh, really? No, that's fine. Thanks so much.
37:16We became aware that the NTSB were investigating events where a turbine wheel and a turbocharger came away.
37:23Kirk, it's happened twice before.
37:25Could an engine component on the Piper Malibu have come apart and punctured the exhaust system, releasing toxic fumes into the cabin?
37:38We don't know what the cause of the bang was on the outbound flight from Cardiff to Nantes, and we may never know.
37:44Investigators learn of two similar cases in the United States.
37:47In both cases, the pieces of the turbocharger were only left score marks.
37:55Tailpipes were never punctured.
37:58We considered it unlikely that a failure of the turbocharger would have allowed carbon monoxide to enter the cabin.
38:05Well, what if the tailpipe cracked on its own?
38:10Well, it is a pretty harsh environment inside the engine.
38:14Exactly. Heat, vibration, prime conditions for a crack to develop.
38:19Mmm.
38:20Do you look at all the separate components in there for signs of failure or wear, et cetera, and when necessary, you'll replace components?
38:30A visual inspection of the tailpipe is part of their maintenance check.
38:34And the plane only flew for 11 hours after its last inspection.
38:40Maintenance found nothing wrong with the tailpipe or the exhaust system.
38:43Not a lot of time for a crack to develop. Is it even possible?
38:52They study other accidents for instances of cracked tailpipes.
38:59Oh, look at this one.
39:01Investigators find a disturbing case of carbon monoxide leaking into the cabin of a small plane.
39:08A crack in the exhaust formed just six flying hours after a maintenance inspection.
39:13Even if the mechanics had carried out the inspection, a crack may have developed sufficient to cause carbon monoxide to leak into the cabin during those 11 flying hours.
39:23They conclude that a sudden crack in the tailpipe was the likeliest reason carbon monoxide leaked into the cabin.
39:32The maintenance inspection they did on the paper was a visual one.
39:36Is a visual inspection the safest way to identify early signs of cracking in a tailpipe?
39:48According to the engine manufacturer, the best way to test for small cracks is a pressure test.
39:56To inspect the tailpipe, a soapy solution is applied to the exterior. If bubbles form, that means there's a crack.
40:04But is it a requirement for a private operator?
40:13The FAA doesn't mandate it.
40:16What about a commercial one?
40:18Looks like a pressure test is required for commercial operators.
40:22Had the aircraft been maintained under regulations for commercial use, which is the way it was actually being used, it would have meant that during the maintenance there was definitely a documented pressure test of the exhaust system.
40:41If this had been a very small crack that was missed by a visual inspection, maintenance may have caught it.
40:57The AAIB releases its report on the crash.
41:00It concludes the pilot lost control while turning the aircraft to regain visibility, which resulted in an in-flight breakup.
41:10Among the causes, it points to a leak of carbon monoxide into the cabin.
41:15It also cites a lack of safety standards from the operator of the Piper Malibu as a contributing factor.
41:20As a result of the AAIB's investigation, the Civil Aviation Authority launches a campaign to raise awareness of the dangers of grey charters.
41:33David Henderson is ultimately jailed for his role in the accident.
41:38This was a real moment for the industry to take a good hard look at itself, to use that as an opportunity to try to change things, to try to make sure that something like this didn't happen again.
41:48There were a lot of supporting organizations for which grey charter might have been part of the culture of those organizations.
41:57And I think this accident made them sit up and take notice about the risks that their members were taking.
42:03It was a risk that ultimately took the life of Emiliano Sala, a rising football star, on the day he said goodbye to his teammates in Nantes and flew towards his new future.
42:15To be continued...
42:17To be continued...
42:18To be continued...