I don't know about anyone else, but to me this sounds like a lot more than a stabilizer problem - unless the stabilizer shook right off the tail at the last minute.

http://www.canoe.ca/WorldTicker/CANOE-wire.Alaska-Airlines-Crash.html

February 3, 2000

NTSB: Plane was 'tumbling, spinning, nose-down' as it crashed

PORT HUENEME, Calif. (AP) -- Moments before it crashed, Alaska Airlines Flight 261 started "tumbling, spinning, nose-down" as it hurtled toward the Pacific Ocean, a federal investigator said Wednesday.

The MD-83 jetliner was in one piece and there were no signs of fire or smoke when it hit the water, killing all 88 people aboard, witnesses told investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board.

As it passed over Anacapa Island, just off the Southern California coast, a witness heard several popping sounds, watched the plane turn, then plunge into the Santa Barbara Channel, NTSB member John Hammerschmidt said.

"The aircraft was twisting, flying erratically, nose rocking," the witness told investigators, Hammerschmidt said. Pilots in the vicinity described the plane as "tumbling, spinning, nose-down, continuous roll, corkscrewing and inverted," he said.

Earlier Wednesday, searchers recovered one of the "black box" recorders that could reveal more clues about what caused the jet to crash.

The remote-controlled underwater robot Scorpio broke the surface of the Santa Barbara Channel shortly before sundown clutching the cockpit voice recorder, which contains tape of conversations between crew members, air traffic controllers and other sounds in the cockpit.

The search continued in about 213 metres of water for a companion box -- the flight data recorder -- that records data of a plane's mechanical operation.

Investigators hope the recorders will help find what happened in the terrifying few minutes between the pilots' first report of mechanical problems on Alaska Flight 261 and plane's nose-dive into the Pacific. Five crew members and 83 passengers were on the flight Monday to San Francisco and Seattle from Puerto Vallarta, a Mexican vacation spot.

On Wednesday, there was a new report the plane had mechanical problems on its flight down to Puerto Vallarta.

The Seattle Times reported there were problems with a part of the tail called the horizontal stabilizer on the flight to Mexico. The device keeps the plane flying level. The airline said it was unaware of any problems with the plane.

Alaska Airlines spokesman Jack Evans in Seattle denied the report: "We stand by what we said earlier this week, which is that we're not aware of any maintenance anomalies with this aircraft."

Hammerschmidt said the agency is investigating the newspaper report, and is interviewing pilots from the earlier flight.

Meanwhile, a jammed horizontal stabilizer forced an American Airlines MD-80 to land in Phoenix 20 minutes after takeoff Wednesday, said Phil Frame, a spokesman for the NTSB in Washington. The plane, which had been headed toward Dallas, is part of the same series of aircraft as the Alaska MD-83 that crashed.

Also Wednesday, dozens of coast guard and navy ships were ordered to abandon the search for survivors of Flight 261 and shift their focus to recovering flight recorders and wreckage.

"We have far exceeded our estimate of survivability," coast guard Vice-Adm. Thomas Collins said.

Just before Flight 261 crashed, the pilots reported struggling with a jammed stabilizer. The pilots also radioed a Seattle maintenance crew about the problem, and the NTSB on Wednesday began analysing recordings of that call, Jim Hall, chairman of the NTSB, said on morning talk shows.

"Obviously these pilots were struggling to maintain control of this aircraft for a significant period of time. It's going to be very important to this investigation," Hall said.

The search for survivors had gone on for 41 hours and included dozens of coast guard, navy and civilian ships, boats and aircraft that combed a 2,800-square-kilometre area.

About 80 family members had arrived at an assistance centre in the Renaissance Hotel in Los Angeles by Tuesday night and another 50 were expected to show up Wednesday, said Chris Thomas, an American Red Cross volunteer.

Many of those who had arrived at the hotel remained in a state of shock, he said.

"I just want to know that our family members didn't suffer and that it was just fast," said Janis Ost Ford, whose brother Bob Ost was on board the plane.

Alaska Airlines and Red Cross officials planned to take family members to the coast near the crash site Thursday.

"They will be able to deal with the emotional responses; they'll be able to see the search-and-rescue recovery process," Thomas said.

-- Steve Baxter (chicoqh@home.com), February 03, 2000

Answers

And this amazing fact:

http://www.msnbc.com/news/364560.asp

" A park ranger who watched the crash from nearby Anacapa Island reported seeing an aircraft nearly overhead descending, ... saw the aircraft make a right turn for 270 degrees ... impacted the water going approximately 80 degrees nose down, said Hammerschmidt.

In addition, a witness took photographs of the plane before, during and after the crash, the NTSB reported."
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-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), February 03, 2000.

80 degrees nose down??? Ouch! That's damn-near vertical.

-- Steve Baxter (chicoqh@home.com), February 03, 2000.

Criminal negligence...they (the crew) should have ditched at the first sign of trouble!!!

-- Z (Z@Z.Z), February 03, 2000.

Ditched at first sign of trouble???? And where would that have been - 30 minutes before crash??? Right into LA basin????? Into millions of people? Hardly think we can second guess.

-- Sheri (wncy2k@nccn.net), February 03, 2000.