So says one aviation insider concerning the crash of Flight 587 (9/13 Wash. Post).

The big problem for crash investigators is that the plane was coming apart before it impacted. Both engines were found some distance from the major impact areas, and there were at least four of those. In addition, the vertical stabilizer and, reportedly, part of a wing were hauled from Jamaica Bay, which separates the Rockaways from NYC. I noticed that the control surface (rudder) was missing from the vertical stabilizer in pictures aired yesterday on CNN.

The most likely scenario for this tragedy would appear to be a catastrophic engine failure which ejected turbine or compressor parts at high velocity into the fuel tank where an explosion resulted which blew the plane apart in mid-air.

As we've heard in the discussions surrounding the crash of Flight 800, it is difficult to make aviation fuel explode without some high energy soucre of ignition, so this hypothectical sequence of events is an unlikely one, and that probably accounts for some of the bewilderment of crash investigators.

sp