<

A300: Europe's Answer to US Aviation
Monday, November 12, 2001
The Associated Press

The American Airlines A300 that crashed after taking off from Kennedy airport carried 246 passengers and nine crew members, the Federal Aviation Administration said.

NEW YORK -- AP
The European-made A300 Airbus jetliner was designed three decades ago to challenge American domination of commercial aviation.

Five other A300s have crashed since 1988, the year American Airlines took delivery of the plane that went down Monday in New York. An IranAir plane was mistakenly shot down by a U.S. Navy missile cruiser in the Persian Gulf. In addition, A300s have figured in three terrorist hijackings, including the one that was ended by an Israeli military raid at Entebbe, Uganda.

The wide-bodied, twin-engine airliner and its successors, the A310 and A320, are built by the French-British consortium Airbus Industrie Ltd. Some components are manufactured in Germany and Spain, and the planes use U.S.-designed General Electric or Pratt & Whitney turbofan engines.

The National Transportation Safety Board said the cause of Monday's crash appeared to have been accidental. Witnesses to the crash reported seeing an engine fall off the plane. The engines, which are located under each wing, were made by GE.
(More: WorldNews.com News Source)
2001 © The Associated Press.

Dan