Continental rejects Concorde blame
(CNN) -- Continental Airlines has rejected the blame for causing a Concorde supersonic jet to crash near Paris leading to the deaths of 113 people.
Earlier Tuesday an official French report was published saying a metal strip that fell off a Continental DC-10 and a fuel tank design fault on Concorde caused the disaster in July 2000.
But Continental later released a statement in which the airline, based in Houston, Texas, denied any responsibility for the crash and vowed to defend itself in court.
"We strongly disagree that anything Continental did was the cause of the Concorde accident, and we are outraged that media reports have said criminal charges may be made against our company and its employees," the statement said.
"We are confident that there is no basis for a criminal action and we will defend any charges in the appropriate courts. We are unable to comment further at this time."
French public prosecutor Xavier Salvat had said expert testimony had shown "a direct causal link" between the bursting of a tire on Concorde and the crash.
He said the Air France plane had run over a titanium alloy strip that fell off the Continental aircraft that took off minutes before from Charles de Gaulle airport, north of Paris.
Salvat told reporters in Cergy-Pontoise, near Paris, the metal strip had played a "major role" in the bursting of the tire, fragments of which then punctured Concorde's fuel tanks.
The official 237-page report also highlighted a "serious fault" in the design of Concorde, whose tanks had insufficient protection from debris.
According to Reuters, Salvat said a U.S. probe had shown the replacement titanium alloy strip fitted to the DC-10 had not been authorized by the U.S. Civil Aviation authorities.
He said Continental had failed to respect rules governing metal fixtures used in building aircraft, and that the characteristics of the strip "played a major role in the process of cutting the Concorde's tire."
Most of the 109 passengers on the Concorde that crashed on July 25, 2000, were German tourists on the first leg of a planned Caribbean cruise holiday. Four people also died at a hotel near the airport into which the plane crashed in a ball of fire.
Despite modifications ordered in the wake of the crash, Air France and British Airways later took all of their Concordes out of service.
