Special Hearings — Helderberg Flight Special Hearing — 1998-06-01

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: It was a very hectic time, Dr, I can assure you, it was hectic, hectic, there was no logical ...(intervention)

DR KLATZOW: We'll get to that in due course.  Are you aware that there's a thing in the aircraft called a cockpit voice recorder?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Yes.

DR KLATZOW: You're aware too that it records the last half hour of conversation in the aircraft?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Depending on your aeroplane.

DR KLATZOW: Correct.  But in that aircraft it recorded the last half hour,

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Yes.

DR KLATZOW: You're aware that that cockpit voice recording was recovered from Mauritius?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Yes.

DR KLATZOW: You're aware that that cockpit voice recording was transcribed at great expense by Colonel Leonard Jansen, are you aware of that?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Yes.

DR KLATZOW: You're aware that an official version of that cockpit voice recording exists?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Yes.

DR KLATZOW: And was accepted by the Margo Commission?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Yes.

DR KLATZOW: You're aware that on that recording there was a discussion involving dinner being served in the cockpit, are you aware of that?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Yes.

DR KLATZOW: When is dinner served aboard SAA flights out of Taipei?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: You mean for passengers?

DR KLATZOW: To the passengers and to the cockpit crew.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: It's not the same time.

DR KLATZOW: When is it served to the passengers?  Let's do it peace meal.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Nice word peace meal.  I would be - what time did the aeroplane get airborne?

DR KLATZOW: About just after 1 o'clock our time.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Dr, I would be wrong to tell you what the plan - what they gave people on the aeroplane, because I don't know.

DR KLATZOW: Captain Mitchell,

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Yes,- I'll come back to - by the crew, I'll tell you about ...(intervention)

DR KLATZOW: How long have you being flying?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: 40 years.

DR KLATZOW: How many meals have you been served as a proper meal at the top of descent, or just before the top of descent?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: A fair number.

DR KLATZOW: Well this is very interesting evidence, because everybody that I have spoken to, including people who should know,

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Who?

DR KLATZOW: Gert van der Veer.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: He's a pilot?

DR KLATZOW: No, but he flies a lot, and he's a man who should know what goes on, many other pilots, and I can give you their names,

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Yes, I'd like that.

DR KLATZOW: I will in due course.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Go ahead.

DR KLATZOW: I'm not going to do it now, but many people have told me that it is extremely unlikely that a meal be served in the cockpit just outside Mauritius.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: May I give you another point of view if I may, Commissioner, you're suggesting that just prior to going down somebody asked for his meal.

DR KLATZOW: No, that's not what I suggested, Captain Mitchell, listen to the question.  A meal was being served to the cockpit crew, not somebody asked for a meal, a meal was being served to everybody in the cockpit.  Now you've read that tape-recording,

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Ages ago.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Well I want to put it to you prevaricating, because it's quite clear from that tape-recording that a meal was being served to everybody in the cockpit.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: You had things to eat on the way down if you wanted to you, can I - will you let me just talk a little bit and tell you about this?

DR KLATZOW: Yes, let me hear.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: If you had a crew coming out of Taipei, you have a double crew and what would happen is that probably the first part of the crew - no, let's talk, the first part of the crew would sleep in the afternoon and the second crew would operate the aeroplane to about halfway.  Now, that means that they would fly 4/5 hours, then the crew would change over.  Now, the decision was that at that stage there, Dr, is that when you - they would have been feeding passengers, but as crew you would eat meals, your own meal, the hot/cold meals whatever you felt like, you'd call for it yourself.  You don't have to eat with everybody else, because your time frame's out, you're in Taipei time, you're not in South African time, you'd eat at all the wrong times of the day, so when you're hungry, you call for your meal.  And that's what happens, so probably a crew flew halfway and then they changed over, so that man or men, they went into the bunks and the next crew got into the operating, and then they and just before ...(indistinct) and it's 25 minutes for a descent or probably 5 or 10 minutes before then, the people would be woken up, they're going to go down and say, bring me my meal and he'd have his meal, and that is quite normal, I have done this hundreds of times.

DR KLATZOW: Who was the pilot on-board that aircraft?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Dawie Uys.

DR KLATZOW: Who would have flown it out of Taipei?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: I have no idea.

DR KLATZOW: Well, is it not likely that the captain would have done so?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: No, why, there's three pilots.

DR KLATZOW: Who was the main engineer aboard that?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: I don't know.

DR KLATZOW: Joe Bellagada.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: No, that doesn't follow - we changed all the time.

DR KLATZOW: He was the main engineer aboard that aircraft, he was the senior man.

DR KLATZOW: Your point is?

DR KLATZOW: Joe Bellagada, Dawie Uys and other members of the crew were being served a meal and every indication was that it was part of the normal meal service, it was not something which happened in an unusual way such as you described, and inter alia, let me just finish, inter alia Jimmy Mouton and the Flight Engineers Association interpreted that meal in exactly the same way as I've interpreted it, namely that it was a meal served in the normal course of events and would have been served shortly after that aircraft reached its cruising altitude.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: For the crew that were there, yes, the operating crew, but not for the crew who had gone to the bunks already.

DR KLATZOW: It wasn't the crew in the bunks, it was in the cockpit.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: No, sorry, the bunker is next to the cockpit.

DR KLATZOW: It was in the cockpit, it was recorded in the cockpit.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: But I have no difficulty with that, I'm agreeing with you, I'm agreeing with you.  The crew in the cockpit, those three would have got their meal, but they would have eaten and flown.

DR KLATZOW: Well are you suggesting that that meal was served half way between Taipei and Johannesburg?

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: That could at ...(indistinct) or anywhere.  You eat when you want to, you're not - there's no mealtimes, Dr.  When you're flying, you eat when you want to eat.  I personally don't eat probably for the first six hours when I'm flying, for a reason ...(intervention)

DR KLATZOW: Captain Mitchell,

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Yes sir?

DR KLATZOW: I don't want to be unpleasant, but I'm going to put it to you that you're lying.

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: No, I'm not lying ...(intervention)

DR KLATZOW: I want to put it to you that you're the only person who put that interpretation on this event ...(intervention)

MICHAEL PETER MITCHELL: Well, I'm the - I have the experience here and I really object to that, I want to take not of this, I object to that.  I do no lie, I can tell you I've been flying for 42 years and I've got dozens of people who will do exactly the same as I will, dozens, in this Airline where I'm flying dozens, they do not eat at one time, they eat when they feel like it, they change when they like, my stomach is not the same as yours, so I object to that, Dr ...(intervention)

DR KLATZOW: Precisely.