----------------------------Original message----------------------------
---------------------------- Forwarded with Changes ---------------------------
>From: [log in to unmask] at @UCSD
>Date: 4/3/98 11:12AM
>To: larry cruse at UCSDLIBRARY
>Subject: [Aircraft List] Map maker sued (fwd)
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=A0      April 3, 1998
 Web posted at: 10:34 a.m. EST (1534 GMT)
 
 DENVER (AP) -- The families of some of those killed when Commerce
Secretary Ron Brown's plane crashed
 have sued Jeppesen Sanderson, claiming the Colorado company's map used=
 by
pilots put the plane on a
collision course.
 
 The April 1996 crash of the plane into a mountain near Dubrovnik, Croa=
tia,
 and the subsequent deaths were
caused by the "defective, unreasonably dangerous and unsafe condition" =
of
the Jeppesen chart, the lawsuit claims.
 
 The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Denver Thursday, also cla=
ims
"the Jeppesen chart listed a minimum
descent altitude for the approach which was too low and put ... the
aircraft on a collision course with the mountain."
 
 Brown and 34 others died when the plane crashed on a flight from Tuzla=
,
Bosnia, to the Cilipi Airport near Dubrovnik.
Eight families filed the lawsuit.
 
 The lawsuit says that the U.S. Air Force pilots flying the military
version of a Boeing 737-200 aircraft were
misguided by the Jeppesen chart as they made their landing approach to =
the
airport. The plane crashed
 into a mountain 1.8 miles northeast of the airport.
 
 The lawsuit claims the chart's defects included its failure to inform =
the
pilots that only aircraft equipped with
two non-directional beacon (NDB) navigator radio receivers could safely=
 
make the approach; failure to properly
list the NDB stations that the crew was required to use to make the
approach; failure to warn the pilots of the
dangers and risks of the approach procedure; and violation of establish=
ed
aviation standards for landing
approach charts.
 
 "In producing the ... approach chart, (Jeppesen) substantially changed=
 the
 procedures promulgated by the
Republic of Croatia for the NDB Runway 12 approach to Cilipi Airport," =
said
 the suit.
 
 Families of the victims are asking for damages ranging from $10,000 to=
 
$30,000.
 
_________________________________________________
Tom Robison
[log in to unmask]
=