9/11 Suits

From this article:

I’m wondering if the PA could then counter for a person who was on a floor that was actually hit by the first plane and say “There’s no amount of planning, making safe conditions, etc. that would have prevented your loved one’s death. He was hit by an airplane!” Could that exempt them from liability in at least those cases?

Zev Steinhardt

Yeah? How many people predicted that terrorists would hijack the planes and crash 'em into buildings? Until that point, the airline industry had every reason to instruct their flight crews to acquiesce to terrorist demands.

There was nothing accidental about the 9/11 hijacks. The people that ARE liable are dead. Sue THEIR estate.

Can we sue the Bin Ladeen family? After all, they supported this crazed idiot, and failed to turn him in to the authorities!
I say, place liens on all Bin-Ladeen-owned properies…there that oughta serve em!

As a matter of fact, anyone who takes money from the Federal Compensation Boards waives their rights to sue anyone – except the terrorists. They’re still legitimate targets (assuming you can find their assets in the US).

Zev Steinhardt

I wonder what is truly going on in the minds of the potential plaintiffs?

They lost loved ones due to no fault of their own. Their worlds were permanently changed for the worse (assuming the deceased was not an alcoholic, wife beating pederast…)

They are offered what - approx $1.5 million by the fed gov’t.

How much more do they think they should receive?
Exactly who do they think should pay?
Do they think they DESERVE more. or do they simply think they can GET more?
Do they think a lawsuit will result in any beneficial improvements in airline/building safety?

I cannot predict how I would act if my spouse were a 9/11 casualty. But I hope that I would accept the federal settlement and move on with my life.

I thought someone was suing the Bin Laden family.

According to my sources (a History Channel documentary) The WTC was plane proof. The biggest plane flying when the WTC was designed was a 707. Suing someone for not having the physchic powers to forsee future planes designs looks to be the only option here :rolleyes:

I’ll also add that the 707 was one of the biggest commercial planes at the time. The designers were assuming that it would be a plane lost in fog or something, and since it would be on final approach, fly at a much slower speed. (175 mph IIRC)

The 9/11 planes hit at 400 mph and 500 mph.

Also, as I recall from either the same documentary or a similar one, the buildings were only designed not to completely topple over from just the impact of the planes. This the buildings did, and withstood the tremendous heat of tons of burning jet fuel, for an hour or so, anyway. That the buildings didn’t fall over immediately after the crashes indicates to me that there is no code violation, and the structure performed better than design.

To put a finer point on it: If I light your house on fire and the roof collapses because everything under it has turned to ash, does that mean the roof wasn’t up to code?

I have to admit I was a little disappointed that this thread wasn’t decrying the tackiness of some horrible red, white and blue suit coat with the words NEVAR FORGITT!!!11 airbrushed on the back. This is much more depressing.

I’m just shocked that no one is in here defending this lunacy. Lunatics I can accept. Defense of lunatics is intolerable.

Yeah. Regardless of the subsequent actions of the hijackers, people were arguing for better cockpit security long before 9/11. Here’s a guy who claims his organization was lobbying for strengthened cockpit doors 40 years ago.

I agree with you that the airlines and the aircraft manufacturers almost certainly ought to be held not liable in this instance. But it still sounds like a factual question for a jury to me. Or at the very least an issue for summary judgement at trial (a judge might reasonably conclude that the NTSB’s “recommendation” that keys be available in the cabin carried the force of law necessary to eliminate liability in this instance). But I don’t see where stopping a suit before it ever starts furthers the interest of justice here.

Again, a perfectly reasonable and correct conclusion of fact for a jury to make.

Yes and no. With supposedly 70% of airplane accidents due either partly or entirely to pilot error there is some basis for this position in ordinary life. A pilot does, in fact, have a great deal of control over what happens during a flight. On the other hand, “pilot error” is defined much more broadly than people would think.

I will try. However, due to storm damage my curent Internet connection is not only slow but very unreliable so for the next week or so my appearance at these boards will be very hit-or-miss.

Not to my knowledge. The airlines are being sued, but not the legitimate pilots. I haven’t heard that the familes of the hijacking pilots are being sued, either.

Does this 70% figure include all accidents, including light aircraft? Are there different figures for light aircraft and large commercial jets?

I never really doubted that the pilot could be at fault; i was more dismayed at the trauma this would put the pilot’s surving family though.

And really, in the case of commercial flights, it seems to me that the only real outsome of such a suit would be to ruin the pilot’s family. I mean, say you have 100 people on a flight; even if the pilot’s estate is worth a million bucks, that’s only 10 grand per family–hardly enough to compensate for the loss in any real way.

I’m not saying the suits are without legal merit–i would just feel really sorry for the family.

The regulation that is the basis for at least some lawsuits is FAR 91.3(a), which states:

This is usually the basis for saying that whatever happens is the pilot’s fault.

As mentioned, I’m having some difficulty (it’s taking me 3-4 tries to get anything to post and I’m getting dropped off my connection a lot) but let’s see about examples:

First of all, the time I made an emergency landing in a field due to weather part of the clean up was making sure the landowner didn’t want compensation for damage to his field. As he had harvested the crop two days before this wasn’t much of an issue, more a formality.

I’m having trouble with a Google search, however, I’ll try to give you enough information to do your own search.

In 1996 a Gulfstream business jet rolled over on take-off. It became an everybody-sue-everybody-else situation
http://www.ainonline.com/issues/05_01/may_2001_21millionpg52.html
http://www.lpba.org/regfeat.htm

Although the families of the pilots received some compensation, it was reduced because of their responsibility in the accident. (Personally, I think the pilots were wholly responsible, and not the airport. Although I was not present the day of the accident, at the time I was based at that airport. The wind was strong enough that the weather instruments were blown off the top of the control tower - which indicates, to my mind, it may be too brisk for flying. But, despite the tower repeatedly advising against take off the pilots kept insisting they could handle it. They couldn’t.)

This was a slightly more recent accident, involving a mid-air between a local radio personality Bob Collins and a student pilot Sharon Hock
http://www.thetracon.com/news/times050601.htm
This one explicitly states Collin’s widow filed a lawsuit against the estate of Hock, as well as Hock’s father filing a lawsuit against the estate of Collins: http://www.thetracon.com/news/trib061300b.htm

As for the 70% I quoted - that’s generally given for ALL accidents.

In the famous (in aviation circles, at least) “Gimli Glider” case the error in fueling that lead to a jet running out of gas at cruising altitude was made by Air Canada line personnel, but the pilots were still held responsible - to the point of having their licenses suspended and discussion of criminal charges against them. Nevermind that their actions lead to a safe landing with no one hurt and only very minor damage to the jet.

And pilot error may be blamed even in a case of mechanical failure. Flight 587 that crashed in New York City after the rudder fell off has been blamed, in part or in whole (depending on who you listen to) on the pilots - the rationale being that they applied the rudder controls too forcefully after being caught in another plane’s wake turbulence.

You are correct that such verdicts can financially ruin a pilot’s family. That’s true even of small airplanes and their crashes. Even if the pilot IS wholly at fault (and that does happen) I’m not sure how deprieving their relatives of an inheritance is supposed to help the situation - the relatives certainly didn’t cause the crash. I think it really does stem from the “well, somebody has to be punished/pay for this” attitude of our society.

Hmmm. Pilots know they can instantly press in a code that lets control know they are being hijacked.
4 of them didn’;t. Coincidence.
Also, Control on the ground can take control of aircraft that have obviously been hijacked. They didn’t.
Planes could have instantly been sent up to intercept them.
They weren’t.
More coincidences.
Methinks the filers of the lawsuits forget the airplanes, go after the government, who are the ones responsible for allowing this to happen.

I wasn’t aware this could be done, and if so, that’s an even better way to hijack a plane.

A huge remote control flying bomb.

Hmm… to quote NurseCarmen in a GQ thread, conspiracy theory much?
What you’re referring to here is a pilot changing the transponder code from the ATC-assigned number to 7500. There is no indication that the pilots had any time to do that; the terrorists simply entered the cockpit and killed them, none of this “take this plane to Cuba” stuff.

To my knowledge, there is no such system installed on all commercial airliners. Please provide a cite.

Umm… they were sent to intercept Flight 93 before it crashed in PA. Prior to 9/11, F-16s weren’t kept fueled on the runway waiting to go, and they still can’t get anywhere “instantly.” And prior to that day, rules of engagement prohibited shooting down civilian planes.

And since this is The Pit, methinks you should get a fucking clue and stop spreading this conspiracy horseshit here. Everything has been brought up before and thoroughly debunked, you’re not contributing anything new.

Thanks for the links, Broomstick. There’s some great info there.

I managed to find a couple of articles about the Gimli Glider–what a fascinating story. I’d never heard of it before, but then again in 1983 i was 14 and living in Australia.