Maintenance company goes on trial

VALUJET CRASH

By CATHERINE WILSON

The Associated Press

MIAMI --- An airline maintenance company and two of its employees went on trial Tuesday, accused of improperly packaging the oxygen canisters blamed for the 1996 ValuJet crash in the Everglades that killed all 110 people aboard.

The federal case against SabreTech represents an extraordinary instance in which a maintenance company was charged with criminal offenses for an airline crash. SabreTech also faces murder and manslaughter charges in state court.

Federal proscecutors said the company falsified service records and delivered mislabeled oxygen generators that eventually started the cargo-hold fire that brought the plane down.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Caroline Heck Miller told the jury that SabreTech sacrificed safety for the sake of profits. She said Sabretech rushed the transport of the canisters to avoid financial penalties for not meeting ValuJet's deadlines.

SabreTech focused "on profits, on beating penalty clauses and moving work through quickly," she said. "Time was pressing, and that penalty clock was ticking."

The company, its vice president for maintenance, Daniel Gonzalez, and mechanic Eugene Florence are charged with making false entries on repair documents. SabreTech also is charged with causing ValuJet to place the canisters on the aircraft.

The oxygen generators are used to provide air to passengers in the event of sudden loss of cabin pressure. When activated, their external temperature can rise up to 500 degrees.

Normally, the canisters are installed above the passenger seats; the canisters blamed for the ValuJet crash were being carried in the hold as cargo.

Prosecutors said SabreTech handed five cartons of generators to ValuJet without installing safety caps on the devices. Moreover, some of the generators were packed in a paper-towel box.

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