Delays threaten British pilots' effort to circle globe in 80 days
     HONG KONG - April 26, 1998 11:49 p.m. EDT -- Two British micro-
 light pilots who are trying to duplicate the feat of the fictitious
 Phileas Fogg and circle the globe in 80 days are running behind
 schedule because of delays in Saudi Arabia and China.
     Brian Milton, 55, and Keith Reynolds, 45, have arrived in Hong
 Kong, the South China Morning Post reported Monday. On their way to
 a landing Sunday at busy Kai Tak airport, their tiny aircraft
 cruised by the territory's famed skyline.
     The newspaper said the pilots had been grounded for five days in
 Hanoi, Vietnam, awaiting permission from Chinese authorities to fly
 through Chinese airspace.
     Milton and Reynolds submitted four different flight plans before
 Chinese authorities granted landing permission, the paper quoted
 spokeswoman Sarah Browse as saying.
     The pilots now are reportedly eight days behind schedule, after
 losing five days in Vietnam and three in Saudi Arabia due to engine
 trouble.
 --------------------------------------------------------------------
              Error may have caused Bogota air crash
     BOGOTA, Colombia - April 26, 1998 11:02 p.m. EDT - The crew of a
 Boeing 727 that crashed in mountains outside Bogota a week ago, kill-
 ing all 53 aboard, may have forgotten to switch on vital equipment
 for measuring altitude and distance, authorities said on Sunday.
     Abel Jimenez, head of the Civil Aviation Authority, told the
 Colombian press agency Colprensa that he believed the crew may have
 failed to turn on the plane's transponder -- part of its radar-guided
 navigation system.
     According to tape-recordings of conversations between flight con-
 trollers at Bogota's El Dorado airport and the jetliner's crew,
 Jimenez said the equipment was only switched on after an urgent
 warning that the 727-200 had veered off course.
     The measure came too late, however, and the Ecuadoran military-
 operated TAME flight, bound for Quito, slammed into tree-lined moun-
 tains on the eastern outskirts of Bogota and burst into a fireball.
     The plane, which was leased to Air France, was ferrying passen-
 gers -- more than 30 of them Europeans -- on the last leg of a flight
 from Paris.
     Jimenez said an international team of crash investigators was
 still looking for clues to the cause of what was Colombia's worst
 air disaster since an American Airlines flight went down near the
 southwest city of Cali in December 1995 with the loss of 159 lives.
     He added that the flight and voice recorders would be sent for
 analysis to the United States on Monday.
     Civil aviation authorities have not said when a preliminary
 report on the crash may be issued.
 -------------------------------------------------------------------
        Train malfunction strands thousands at Denver airport
     DENVER - April 26, 1998 11:13 p.m. EDT -- A routing cable damaged
 by a loose train wheel shut down Denver International Airport's com-
 puterized passenger trains for about seven hours Sunday, creating
 mass confusion among thousands of travelers.
     Passengers were shuttled to and from outlying concourses on 30
 buses until the train system was put back into operation in the
 early evening.
     "I just feel really frustrated because nobody's letting us know
 what's going on and you're kind of nervous because you're afraid
 you're going to miss your flight and people are going to be waiting
 for you," said passenger Kelli Tassardi.
     Passenger Judith Fisher said, "It was hot. No air conditioning.
 The emergency phones weren't working. Nobody seems to know what's
 going on."
     United Airlines, the airport's largest carrier, said about 30
 percent of its flights and an estimated 5,000 passengers were
 affected in some way.
     On Thursday, federal regulators evacuated United's concourse
 after 23 passengers on a commuter flight from Wyoming entered the
 building without being cleared through security. The passengers were
 sent through security screening before being allowed back onto the
 concourse.
     The $5 billion airport opened in February 1995, 16 months late
 due to construction delays and problems with its high-tech baggage
 system.
 ===
--- DB 1.39/004487
---------------