22-03-2013, 08:48 AM
A damning report also found that his co-pilots appeared dangerously tired.
Five Britons were among the dead when AF447 plunged into the Atlantic Ocean as it travelled from Rio de Janeiro in Brazil to Paris in June 2009.
The revelations may help shed light on why the pilots took what air accident investigators describe as "inappropriate" action when the Airbus 330 flew into turbulence during a tropical thunderstorm.
Le Figaro said exhaustion after a weekend's romantic break in Rio lay behind the crash.
Co-pilots Pierre-Cedric Bonin, 32, and David Robert, 37, were unable to bring the plane under control as it rolled from side to side.
Black box recorders showed that Captain Marc Dubois, 58, had been asleep when the trouble started and took more than a minute to return to the cockpit when they alerted him.
Analysis of the flight recorders has established that airspeed sensors had malfunctioned probably because they had frozen up.
But a report commissioned by French magistrates investigating the crash said the captain had been recorded as grumbling shortly after take off: "I didn't sleep enough last night. One hour is not enough."
Le Figaro also published a previously unseen email sent by a friend of Captain Dubois' after the crash showing that he had taken Veronique Gaignard, his girlfriend, who was an off-duty flight attendant, to Rio.
"I can tell you that he was happy because he told me that he was leaving (for Rio) with Veronique and he was so happy that she was there and accompanying him," the mail reads.
Le Figaro said Captain Dubois and Ms Gaignard had driven to see friends an hour from Rio and flown by helicopter over the bay during the weekend.
When he reached the cockpit after being roused, Captain Dubois used words that suggested he was not fully awake, according to French press reports.
"Go down," he told a co-pilot. "No go up. You go up. It's not possible."
The pilots ignored normal procedures and raised, rather than lowered, the plane's nose when it lost lift or, in technical parlance, "stalled".
An aerodynamic stall is a loss of lift, and not a stall of the engines, which investigators said had operated and responded throughout.
The terrifying result was a three-and-a-half minute plunge before hitting the ocean.
The French aviation safety authority, the BEA has already released a report which concurs with a 365-page judicial inquiry that the "captain had failed in his duties" and "prevented the co-pilot from reacting appropriately". French judges have launched a criminal inquiry into Air France and Airbus for alleged manslaughter.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnew...sleep.html
Five Britons were among the dead when AF447 plunged into the Atlantic Ocean as it travelled from Rio de Janeiro in Brazil to Paris in June 2009.
The revelations may help shed light on why the pilots took what air accident investigators describe as "inappropriate" action when the Airbus 330 flew into turbulence during a tropical thunderstorm.
Le Figaro said exhaustion after a weekend's romantic break in Rio lay behind the crash.
Co-pilots Pierre-Cedric Bonin, 32, and David Robert, 37, were unable to bring the plane under control as it rolled from side to side.
Black box recorders showed that Captain Marc Dubois, 58, had been asleep when the trouble started and took more than a minute to return to the cockpit when they alerted him.
Analysis of the flight recorders has established that airspeed sensors had malfunctioned probably because they had frozen up.
But a report commissioned by French magistrates investigating the crash said the captain had been recorded as grumbling shortly after take off: "I didn't sleep enough last night. One hour is not enough."
Le Figaro also published a previously unseen email sent by a friend of Captain Dubois' after the crash showing that he had taken Veronique Gaignard, his girlfriend, who was an off-duty flight attendant, to Rio.
"I can tell you that he was happy because he told me that he was leaving (for Rio) with Veronique and he was so happy that she was there and accompanying him," the mail reads.
Le Figaro said Captain Dubois and Ms Gaignard had driven to see friends an hour from Rio and flown by helicopter over the bay during the weekend.
When he reached the cockpit after being roused, Captain Dubois used words that suggested he was not fully awake, according to French press reports.
"Go down," he told a co-pilot. "No go up. You go up. It's not possible."
The pilots ignored normal procedures and raised, rather than lowered, the plane's nose when it lost lift or, in technical parlance, "stalled".
An aerodynamic stall is a loss of lift, and not a stall of the engines, which investigators said had operated and responded throughout.
The terrifying result was a three-and-a-half minute plunge before hitting the ocean.
The French aviation safety authority, the BEA has already released a report which concurs with a 365-page judicial inquiry that the "captain had failed in his duties" and "prevented the co-pilot from reacting appropriately". French judges have launched a criminal inquiry into Air France and Airbus for alleged manslaughter.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnew...sleep.html
"The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The point, however, is to change it." Karl Marx
"He would, wouldn't he?" Mandy Rice-Davies. When asked in court whether she knew that Lord Astor had denied having sex with her.
“I think it would be a good idea” Ghandi, when asked about Western Civilisation.
"He would, wouldn't he?" Mandy Rice-Davies. When asked in court whether she knew that Lord Astor had denied having sex with her.
“I think it would be a good idea” Ghandi, when asked about Western Civilisation.