Face of Nation : An American Airlines mechanic is accused of sabotaging a flight because he was upset about stalled contract negotiations and wanted to earn some overtime fixing the plane.
According to a criminal complaint affidavit filed in federal court in Miami, Abdul-Majeed Marouf Ahmed Alani admitted during an interview Thursday that he tampered with a navigation system on a plane before a July 17 flight. Alani was scheduled to make his first court appearance on the charge Friday afternoon. He was charged with willfully damaging or disabling an aircraft. The 60-year-old had worked for American since 1988 but was suspended after his arrest.
The incident occurred before an American jet was scheduled to fly from Miami to Nassau in the Bahamas with 150 people on board. As the pilots powered up the plane at Miami International Airport, they saw an error message for a system that tracks speed, nose direction and other critical flight information and aborted the takeoff.
“Alani stated that his intention was not to cause harm to the aircraft or its passengers,” according to the affidavit by Jose A. Ruiz, a federal air marshal who serves on an FBI terrorism task force.
Alani explained that stalled contract negotiations between American Airlines and the mechanics’ unions were hurting him financially, and he tampered with the plane “to cause a delay or have the flight cancelled in anticipation of obtaining overtime work,” Ruiz wrote.
American has accused mechanics of an illegal work slowdown that has led to hundreds of cancelled flights in recent months. The airline successfully sued two unions that represent the workers. This week, both sides announced that they will resume negotiations Sept. 16 in Washington, with help from a federal mediator. The mechanics’ unions have been trying to secure a new contract for more than three years.
In a statement, American Airlines said it cooperated fully with the investigation “and we are taking this matter very seriously.” The Fort Worth, Texas-based airline said the plane was taken out of service after the July incident and repaired and inspected before it was allowed to fly again.
