[cardinal4]

That you could snap off a tail with rudder inputs raised a lot of eyebrows, but I believe it was in the Airbus manual.

Wasnt a composite material initially blamed? Now you know why they always say, "Caution wake turbulence form departing 747" with instructions to position and hold or cleared for takeoff..

[COEXERJ145]

There have been other incidents of Airbus rudders tearing off in flight. IIRC, the most recent was an A310 which is basically a shorter A300.

Despite the fact that some conspiracy theorists think it was a bomb, there is no evidence to support it.

Of course some people think Valujet 592 was a terrorist bomb and they probably think every single plane crash in history was a terrorist act.

The truth is, only a small percentage of plane crashes have been caused by criminal acts. Nearly all are caused by human error, mechanical failure, or most often, a combination of both.

[Knuckledragger]

The vertical stab was fine. Ya, people blamed it, but there wasn't anything structurally wrong with it.

I just looked up the ATSB's findings and here is their conclusion:

3.2 Probable Cause

The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was the in-flight separation of the vertical stabilizer as a result of the loads beyond ultimate design that were created by the first officer’s unnecessary and excessive rudder pedal inputs. Contributing to these rudder pedal inputs were characteristics of the Airbus A300-600 rudder system design and elements of the American Airlines Advanced Aircraft Maneuvering Program.

Whole report: Warning! Big PDF.

http://www.ntsb.gov/publictn/2004/AAR0404.pdf