The family members of Fabio Altruda , the pilot who died after the crash of an Air Force Eurofighter which took place a few kilometers from Birgi, in the Trapani area, filed a complaint with the Public Prosecutor's Office. They hypothesize that at the basis of the accident, during the return from a mission on December 13th, there was a breakdown.
The investigation is against unknown persons for plane crash and manslaughter but other investigations are underway: that of the Air Force and that of the Military Prosecutor of Naples on a possible hypothesis of destruction of military assets.
The Armed Forces has already ensured "maximum transparency, collaboration and full trust in the judiciary".
Altruda was returning from the military airport of Istrana (Treviso) together with another Eurofighter that preceded him. He had left Trapani Birgi at 9, always flying in pairs, «to head towards Istrana as part of an operational mission (not an exercise) aimed at escorting a US military aircraft. The two soldiers - the report reconstructs - at the end of that mission had lunched and also rested in Istrana, resuming the return flight at about 16.50 to return to Trapani, communicating in constant radio contact with each other, and so regularly until moment of disaster."
The return flight, it is learned, would not have been part of the operational mission, but was a training activity. The captain had begun the landing maneuvers and brought down the trolleys when an electrical blackout, according to family members, would have caused him to crash.
The pilot's parents don't believe in the explosion of the aircraft or even in the so-called spatial disorientation of the officer , and want to learn more.
The black boxes, held by the Air Force, should be analyzed next week in England in the center where the fighters are built.
(Unioneonline/ss)