Gag order, confusing flight data plague Taiwan crash inquiry
   TAIPEI - March 2, 1998 07:24 a.m. EST - The mystery of a February
 plane crash that killed 202 people in Taiwan deepened on Monday after
 the release of flight data that yielded more questions than answers.
 A gag order has also been placed on those involved in the
 investigation.
     Aviation regulators said they were ordered by prosecutors not to
 reveal more information about the China Airlines crash -- Taiwan's
 worst ever -- even though analysis of the airliner's flight recorders
 had been completed in Australia.
     "I wish I could give more details, but we have been ordered by
 the prosecutor not to reveal any information during the course of
 the investigation," Civil Aeronautics Administration deputy director
 Chang Kuo-cheng told reporters.
     As is standard procedure, prosecutors declared the crash a crim-
 inal matter soon after it occurred, obliging investigators to
 observe Taiwan's judicial confidentiality rules.
     There has been no suggestion of foul play.
     Chang repeatedly declined to say whether analysis of the "black
 box" voice and flight data recorders, which were returned from Aus-
 tralia on Sunday, had found error or fault with the pilot or the
 aircraft, made by Europe's Airbus Industrie.
     Chang declined to respond to numerous local media reports -- in-
 cluding one from the official Central News Agency -- quoting inves-
 tigators as suggesting human error was to blame.
     Chang's agency, which is investigating the crash of China Air-
 lines' Flight 676 on its Feb. 16 evening return from Bali, Indonesia,
 issued only technical data about the flight's final minutes -- but
 withheld release of any conclusions.
     Data from the digital flight data recorder indicated the Airbus
 A300-600R had been flying too high in its final approach to Taipei's
 international airport and failed in an effort to undertake a "go-
 around" that would have aborted the landing, the agency said in a
 brief statement released by Chang.
     The statement said an alarm heard on airport tower tapes and the
 black box recordings had been determined to be an overspeed alarm.
 After the alarm sounded, the plane attempted to climb, but lost speed
 and crashed, it said.
     The statement gave no indication as to why the plane was flying
 too high, why the go-around failed or why the aircraft was unable to
 climb after the warning sounded.
     The limited data left open the question of whether human error
 or mechanical failure was at fault and appeared to leave ample room
 for either to be declared the cause of the crash.
     The Central News Agency and leading newspapers and television
 stations quoted investigators anonymously as saying the pilot had
 lost control of the aircraft.
     According to the unconfirmed media accounts, the pilot discovered
 he was flying too high and put the jet into a steep descent, but flew
 too low and then tried to pull up.
     By then the jet was too low, and as the pilot tried to climb, the
 plane had lost too much speed, the reports said. The jet's tail sec-
 tion was the first to hit the ground, causing the plane to crash in
 a fireball, they said.
     Like the government's statement, the reports gave no clear ex-
 planation of what caused the irregularities before the crash.
     All 196 people aboard the plane and six on the ground died in
 the crash. The dead included central bank governor Sheu Yuan-dong,
 his wife and three other central bank officials, who had been in
 Bali for discussions of Asia's financial crisis.
     It was the second China Airlines crash in four years. A nearly
 identical China Airlines Airbus crashed during a landing approach in
 Nagoya, Japan, in 1994, killing 264 people.
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