National Oct. 06, 2011 - 12:58PM JST ( 4 )

TOKYO —

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism has requested that All Nippon Airways (ANA) draw up measures to prevent a repeat of the last month’s incident in which a plane almost turned upside down during a flight.

The plane, with 117 passengers and crew on board, dived 1,900 meters in 30 seconds in the incident off Shizuoka on Sept 6. The mishap happened when the co-pilot, in trying to unlock the cockpit door for the captain who was returning from the toilet, mistook a rudder control button for the cockpit door lock switch nearby.

The plane, which took off from Naha in Okinawa in the south, later managed to touch down at Tokyo’s Haneda airport safely. Two crew members were slightly injured, while four passengers reported health problems following the incident.

Images from the flight recorder on the Boeing 737-700 showed the plane veered to the right and then sharply to the left, before dropping backwards. The aircraft tipped more than 130 degrees to the left at one point, but the darkness outside meant many of those on board did not realize the craft had almost flipped over. It descended at high speed, losing nearly 2,000 meters before stabilizing.

On Wednesday, the transport ministry requested ANA to carry out an internal investigation to ascertain the cause of the roll and to take measures to prevent a repeat incident, NTV reported.

Futoshi Osada, director general of the Ministries Civil Aviation Bureau, was quoted as saying, “Incidents like this threaten to undermine public trust in the safety of the transportation system.” 

Japan Today