In a written synopsis of argument presented before this Court by counsel
for Air New Zealand it was said that background matters had to be
understood as they were entirely relevant to the complaints made by the
applicants in the present proceedings. But that "the Applicants do not
propose to canvass any factual matters which fall outside the range of
their specified allegations". In regard to that last matter we emphasize
again that this case (as counsel well realized) cannot be used to attack
the Royal Commission findings as to the cause of the crash. On behalf of
the applicants it was made clear nonetheless that their acceptance of
the jurisdictional bar to such a challenge in the Courts did not mean
and should not be used to draw any inference that they accepted the
causation findings themselves (at least in the unqualified form in which
they are set down in the Report). It is simply that they do all readily
accept as they must that in no sense can these proceedings become an
appeal against those findings. It is right to add that throughout the
hearing in this Court that attitude has very properly been reflected in
the submissions we heard. Thus the conclusions as to the cause of the
crash must and do stand.
Late in 1976 Air New Zealand decided to commence a series of
non-scheduled sightseeing journeys from New Zealand to the Ross
Dependency region and return to this country without a touch-down at any
intermediate point. They began with two flights in February 1977. There
were four further journeys in October and November 1977, four in
November 1978, and three more in November 1979--on 7th, 14th and 21st.
The accident flight was to be the fourteenth of the series. In 1977 the
designated route was one which used Cape Hallett on the north-eastern
point of Victoria Land as the first southern waypoint on the continent
itself en route further south either to a point adjacent to the Williams
ice landing field (near Scott and McMurdo bases) or alternatively the
south magnetic pole. One or other became the southernmost waypoint, the
magnetic pole destination being used at the discretion of the pilot if
weather conditions made the McMurdo area unsuitable for sightseeing.
Scott and McMurdo bases are located close together at the south-western
tip of Ross Island which forms the eastern coast of McMurdo Sound. On
the island there are four volcanic mountains including Mt. Erebus, the
highest, at 12,450 feet. The Sound itself, which is about 40 miles long
by 32 miles wide at the narrowest point, lies between mainland
Antarctica and Ross Island and for most of the year it is covered with
flat sea ice.
The first two flights in February 1977 took place with the necessary
approval of the Civil Aviation Division of the Ministry of Transport and
after clearance with the United States naval authorities who control the
air space in the vicinity of McMurdo Station. Those flights followed a
computer-controlled flight track to Cape Hallett thence directly over
Ross Island and Mt. Erebus at the stipulated minimum height of 16,000
feet to the McMurdo waypoint. The co-ordinates of that waypoint had been
written correctly into the flight plan as 77° 53' south latitude and
166° 48' east longitude. Three of the pilots who flew to the Antarctic
in November 1977 were available to give evidence and, like the two
earlier pilots, they agreed that at that time the flight plan followed a
track from Cape Hallett to the McMurdo area which passed virtually
overhead Mt. Erebus. However then and on subsequent occasions the
sightseeing aircraft to the McMurdo area arrived in the general vicinity
of Cape Hallett to find clear air further on and took the opportunity of
visual meteorological conditions to veer laterally from the direct
computer flight track from Cape Hallett by tracking to the west along
the coast of Victoria Land and eventually down McMurdo Sound over the
flat sea ice. Ross Island was thus left to the east while near the head
of the Sound the aircraft would turn left in order to fly over Scott
and McMurdo bases and in the vicinity of Ross Island so that a view
would be obtained of Mt. Erebus and the other three mountains there.
When the decision was made to operate the series of flights to take
place at the end of 1977 a change was made with the approval of the
Civil Aviation Division to permit flights below 16,000 feet down to
6,000 feet in a specified sector south of Ross Island and subject to
such criteria as a cloud base no lower than 7,000 feet, clear visibility
for at least 20 miles and descent under ground radar guidance. It has
been mentioned that similar criteria applied, officially at least, until
the time of the fatal crash. But the written directions were interpreted
by some pilots as leaving them with a degree of discretion to go lower
in ideal weather conditions.
Then in September 1978 steps were taken to print a flight plan for each
Antarctic journey from a record stored in the Air New Zealand ground
based planning computer. And it is at this stage that the longitude
co-ordinate for the southernmost waypoint was fed into the ground
computer as 164° 48' E.