Swissair Takes Blame For Crash

Swissair, in an unannounced move that shocked 30 lawyers representing families suing the airline, offered in federal court Thursday to take responsibility for last year's fatal crash off the coast of Nova Scotia.

Desmond Barry, an attorney for Swissair, told U.S. District Court Judge James Giles that his client as well as codefendants Boeing and Delta Airlines, which had a ticket-sharing deal with Swissair, admitted fault for the accident. Thursday's pretrial conference had been planned to sort out procedural technicalities of the suits against Swissair and other defendants.

Â"We agree to share liability for the accident and pay full compensatory damages for each passenger and crew member,Â" Barry said.

As part of the proposed deal, plaintiffs in the 167 cases currently filed would agree to waive punitive damages. In addition, Barry requested that about 120 of the cases be dismissed from U.S. court for litigation in France or Switzerland because many of the passengers on the plane were from other countries.

Swissair is facing claims totaling $16 billion from families of U.S. victims suing on grounds of gross negligence. The company said it has reached out-of-court settlements with relatives of five victims in France.

The settlement offer came as a surprise to the plaintiff's attorneys present at the hearing, who weren't told about the offer beforehand.

Â"This is extraordinary,Â" said Lee Kreindler, the lead counsel for the plaintiffs. Â"I've never seen this happen before. But better late than never.Â"

Kreindler predicted many of the cases will be settled in the coming month, before the court decides damages.

Flight 111, en route from New York to Geneva, crashed last September after the pilots reported smoke in the cockpit. All 229 people on board were killed.

Investigators still have not identified the cause of the fire that sent the smoke into the cockpit. But Canadian investigators found heat-damaged wiring aboard the crashed MD-11, prompting U.S. air safety officials in January to recommend that airlines inspect all MD-11 jetliners for electrical wiring problems.

At the hearing, many of the plaintiffs' attorneys questioned the validity of the defense proposal. They argued that continuing with the cases would allow families of the victims to know what caused the crash.

Some of the attorneys also said the plaintiffs should be entitled to punitive damages and foreign passengers should be entitled to compensation under U.S. law. Product liability laws in foreign countries tend to be less developed than the laws in the United States and often result in lower damage awards.

The airline's offer came after Swissair said a steward on the MD-11 had reported that crew members reported strange smells in the cabin less than a month before the fatal crash.

The employee said he noticed odor shortly after the plane took off from Zurich for Hong Kong on Ag. 10. The smell became stronger during the flight, prompting the chief steward to file a report to the airline, Swissair spokesman Urs Peter Naef said Tuesday.

Giles on Thursday ordered the defendants to put their proposal in writing to the plaintiffs by early September. The two sides are to meet again in Philadelphia on Sept. 13.

Another defendant, Inflight Technologies, which provided the plane's electronic entertainment system, was not involved in the Thursday's offer.