Two Slides on Air France Plane Failed to Open in Toronto Crash
Aug. 6 (Bloomberg)

Two slides on the Air France plane that crashed at Toronto's Pearson International Airport this week failed to open during the emergency evacuation, Canada's chief investigator said today.

Goodrich Corp., which built the slides, is investigating the incident.

Crew of the Air France Airbus A-340 opened four of the aircraft's eight doors during the emergency evacuation, Real Levasseur, chief investigator with the Canadian Transportation Safety Board, said at a news conference in Toronto today. Goodrich officials are in Toronto to help determine why the slides failed to work, he said.

``Two slides didn't work properly,'' Levasseur said. ``We want to know why they didn't work before removing the wreck.''

Air France Flight 358 on Aug. 2 overshot the runway by 200 meters (656 feet) after landing in a thunderstorm. The plane slid into a ravine and caught fire. All 297 passengers and 12 crew on board evacuated before the plane burst into flames. There were no fatalities and 43 people, including the pilot, were taken to hospital with injuries that weren't life-threatening.

Work on removing the wreckage may begin as early as tomorrow once investigators finish gathering information from the site, Levasseur said. The investigation is starting to move from data gathering to analysis of the crash, he said.

Officials at Air France and Goodrich couldn't immediately be reached for comment.

To contact the reporter on this story:
Theo Argitis in Ottawa at  targitis@bloomberg.net.
I am one of the survivors from the AF flight and there's a lot of theoretical comments that I would love to have happened but it unfortunately didn't.

From what I heard from other passengers afterwards and from what I witnessed myself

Door 1 on the left had a malfunctioned slide. People were told to jump from it. I was one of them.

Door 2 on the left had no slide. People were told to jump from it. One Flight attendant said it was safe to jump off it. When I was trying to evacuate there was a lady looking down at the ground staring at it from the height... I looked down and it had to be at least 4 or 5m high. I decided to give up that exit and went thru business class to door 1.

BTW: The passenger that sat next to me jumped thru door 2 on the left and consequently broke her neck. She's currently in hospital and is waiting for her op this coming week.

According to other pax I spoke to, the 2 doors at the back were working normally. The 1 door on the front right was working normally.