The National Transportation Safety Board have now located a used
rudder from a scrapped A300-600 and this will be used as a comparison
as it continues its ndt tests on the crashed aircraft's vertical stabiliser
and rudder. The search of aircraft salvage yards continues for a vertical
stabiliser.

Investigators have also been looking at the 1997 incident involving
American Airlines Airbus A300-600 which was over West Palm Beach,
Florida when it began a series of pitch, yaw, and roll manoeuvres as the
flight controls oscillated for about 34 seconds, causing the aircraft
to drop 3,000 feet.

A review of the flight data from this incident suggests that the aircraft
experienced high vertical stabiliser airloads. The NTSB determined
that the probable causes of this incident were the flight crew's failure to
maintain adequate airspeed during leveloff, which led to an inadvertent
stall, and their subsequent failure to use proper stall recovery techniques.
A factor contributing to the accident was the flight crew's failure to
properly use the autothrottle.

In a safety recommendation issued earlier this month it was stated
that rapid reversing movements of an aircraft's rudder can, under certain
circumstances, jeopardise the structural integrity of the vertical stabiliser.
The Board is now reviewing the flight recorder data from the 1997 flight
to examine what level of forces the stabiliser was subjected to.

The vertical stabiliser from this aircraft which is still in service has been
removed and will be ultrasonically inspected this week to ascertain if
there is any evidence of damage sustained in the 1997 incident.

The recent discovery by Italian police of a multimillion dollar aircraft
spares scam whereby old and faulty aircraft parts were sold as new has
prompted the Safety Board to investigate if any of Flight 587's major
components and tail assembly could have come from such a source.
The documentation check has shown that all parts were in fact either
original equipment or had been supplied by original equipment
manufacturers.

Relevant Articles:

Flight 587 - NDT Tests Continue
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NASA to help with Airbus Investigation
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Airbus Site Investigations Completed
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New York jet crash investigation now looking at the broken tail section
NDTCabin  14 Nov

New York jet crash engine has a history of failures.
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