As investigators analysed data from the "black box" flight recorders of the doomed American jet, Miss Greleau's employers paid her a warm tribute saying she would be "greatly missed". New York-based Miss Greleau, who worked for Menzies Aviation Group (MAG), was travelling to the Dominican Republic with a colleague when disaster struck. The single 40-year-old had been living in New York for more than a year after moving from her home in Finsbury Park, north London, MAG chief executive Peter Smith said. Her "depth of knowledge and commitment to the business will be greatly missed", he added. The Foreign Office said tonight that despite reports that she was British she held a French passport and as far it was concerned she was French. Meanwhile, the crash investigation was hampered by a fault in the flight data recorder, one of the two black boxes recovered yesterday. George Black, from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), said the recorder is being sent to the manufacturer in Florida to fix a problem with its memory module. "The memory is there. We just can't get to it," Mr Black said.
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Investigators believe the data recorder could hold key information about the final moments of the doomed flight. They hope it may reveal why the co-pilot called for maximum power, as heard on the cockpit voice recorder, just 12 seconds before the crew talked about losing control of the aircraft. The discovery of the voice recorder from the wreckage has revealed that there were problems on the aircraft less than two minutes after take-off. A rattling noise could be heard 107 seconds into the flight, followed by frantic efforts by the pilots to control the plane. Seven seconds later, the captain indicated they were having a "wake encounter", indicating a vortex of turbulence that trails an aircraft, said Mr Black. He said a Japan Airlines 747 took off two minutes and 20 seconds in front of the American Airlines jet, which was normal procedure. After a second rattle was heard, the co-pilot called for maximum power followed by several comments suggesting loss of control. The recording ends less than two and a half minutes after the plane took off from John F Kennedy airport headed for Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. Witnesses said they saw the plane wobble in the sky before breaking apart and showering debris on the neighbourhood along Rockaway Beach, obliterating four homes in the area. NTSB chairwoman Marion Blakey said the most likely cause of the crash was still thought to be an accident. She added: "We have no information that would argue for criminal activity or anything that indicates sabotage to date." But she stressed investigators were still working closely with the FBI and had not yet ruled anything out. Some 262 bodies have been recovered from where the jet crashed. Up to nine people are still missing on the ground. Earlier it emerged that US aviation officials had issued a safety notice a month ago for the type of engine that powered the Airbus A300. The Federal Aviation Administration called for more frequent inspections because it said an "unsafe condition" had been identified in the engine, but the order had not come into force by the time of the crash. As well as Miss Greleau, American Airlines said the dead included 168 US passport holders, 68 with Dominican Republic passports, five infants travelling on a parent's passport, one Taiwanese passport holder, one French, one Haitian and one Israeli. All nine crew, including Captain Edward States and his co-pilot, Sten Molins, were US passport holders. |
Menzies Aviation Group reports that two of its most senior management perished in the New York plane crash of American Airlines flight 587. Dennis Blair (55), managing director and senior vice president-Americas and Sylvie Greleau (40), director, Sales & Marketing-Americas were on the flight to Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic. Mr Blair was responsible for a region that extended from Canada to the Caribbean and Latin America, where he developed operations in Mexico, Chile, Brazil, St Maarten and the Dominican Republic. Ms Greleau joined Ogden Aviation in 1999 and had been active in developing strategic expansion in cargo services for Menzies Aviation Group throughout the Americas region. Steve Harrison, chief financial officer-Americas, will assume interim managerial control for the region, supported by Ted Foster, vice president, Latin American Operations, Larry Snyder, vice president , North American Operations and Alberto Iriberri, vice president, Mexican Operations. A further announcement will be made in due course.
All in all, I think it's most unlikely she would have been a suicide bomber.