SilkAir crash families lose court case

The plane fell out of the sky at 35,000 feet

The families of six people killed in an unexplained 1997 plane crash have lost their court case against the Singapore-based airline SilkAir, their lawyer said on Wednesday.

The relatives alleged the pilot was to blame for the crash and that SilkAir were negligent because they knew he was mentally unsound.

But Singapore High Court Judge Tan Lee Meng said they had failed to prove the crash had been caused intentionally by the pilot.

One-hundred-and-four people died when the Singapore bound Boeing 737-300 crashed into a jungle river in Palembang on 19 December 1997, shortly after leaving the Indonesian capital Jakarta. It was SilkAir's first and only crash.

Suicide theory

SilkAir said there was no evidence the pilot, Tsu Way Ming, had committed suicide by deliberately bringing the plane down.

The airline cited an Indonesian investigation which concluded that he had not been suicidal.

Victims were buried in a mass ceremony

Evidence that the plane's controls had been set in a "nose-down" position and that the engines were on full power were dismissed by SilkAir's lawyers who said the pilot may have been trying to rapidly descend because of an emergency, such as loss of cabin pressure.

However, a separate investigation carried out by the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said there was nothing wrong with the plane and "the accident can be explained by intentional pilot action".

The NTSB said investigations showed Mr Tsu, once a stunt flyer with the Singapore Air Force, was in serious debt from financial market speculation and had been reprimanded by management several times in the weeks before the crash.

The US was asked to participate in the investigation because the plane was made by Seattle-based Boeing Co.

Lawyers for the families said they had not yet decided whether to appeal against the decision.

Most of the other victims' relatives earlier accepted compensation of $200,000 per victim and are not suing.