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Subscribe to RSSAustralian-based Qantas Airways has awarded settlements of up to $400,000 to almost 150 passengers who were injured aboard an Airbus A330 airplane that nosedived twice on Oct. 7, 2008, reports the West Australian.
The flight was traveling from Singapore to Perth with 303 passengers onboard. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau determined that a stream of incorrect data messages caused the plane to plunge 690 feet in 23 seconds and, two minutes later, 400 feet in 15 seconds. Sixty of the passengers and some of the crew were not buckled into their seats when the plane nosedived.
U.S. aviation injury lawyer Floyd Wisner, who is representing 160 passengers and crew from the flight, told the West Australian that the plunge caused injuries that included psychological trauma, fractured vertebrae, broken bones and serious lacerations. At least one passenger suffered a brain injury.
“A payout like this is not unusual,” said Jeff Price, an associate professor of aviation at Metropolitan State College of Denver. “As part of the contract for carriage, airlines have some responsibility to keep you safe during the flight. They cannot protect you from natural acts or acts of God, but for something that is mechanical, such as this, a payout is all but expected.”
Sixteen severely injured passengers, however, are readying a multimillion-dollar lawsuit against aircraft maker Airbus and aircraft technology company Northrop Grumman, which made the plane's data unit.
Qantas was not available to provide a comment to msnbc.com when contacted Friday morning.
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How about they wear their SEATBELTS when they are in their seats???
When do people start taking personal responsibility for their safety?
Yeah, they should build their own roads and educate their own kids. Make their own food and kill their own meat. Let's not forget fight and kill their neighbors when the dog barks and defending their family from the local gang alone when they stop by to rob.
Your Libertarian BS has no place here. In a CIVILIZED society we have courts and the courts meet out JUSTICE, not responsibility. Many of these people were seriously injured. No one remains belted for the entire course of a 12 hour flight. They can develop DVT and die if they do. It is accepted in long range travel you get up and walk every 2-3 hours. The responsibility for faulty software is not an act of God. It is a problem that should have been tested out of the system. One has the REASONABLE expectation that when flying on an airplane, it is not going to fall out of the sky and break their bones. Perhaps in your Libertarian frontier-world people should just bring along their own suture kits and air casts on airplanes and "suck it up"; but everywhere else, we expect the airlines to take RESPONSIBILITY when their aircraft or pilot fails and compensate their passengers.
Please do not blame God or any religions for any natural disasters. God or goddesses are not the one to be blamed.
We have wisdom given by God how to take care the earthly business, such as not dumping toxic/chemical things in rivers or oceans, and if we do, we better know how to solve the problem before we are doing so.
Idiot writer doesn't know how to spell QANTAS = Queensland And Northwest Territories Aerial Services. It is an acronym, where by every letter is a capital.