Claris Law Legal Blogging Community

Editor: James T. Crouse
Profession: Aviation Accident Attorney

Category: Plane Crashes

The National Transportation Board has concluded the 2008 plane crash which killed four people and left Travis Barker and the late DJ AM injured was caused by underinflated tires.

All four tires exploded as the plane raced down the runway for takeoff. The pilot (with only 35 hours in this plane) then tried to abort takoff, but due to sensors in the plane, that was impossible and the plane burst into flames after hitting an embankment.

Tires should be changed after eight days if proper maintenance has not been carried out. This Learjet's tires had not been checked for three weeks prior to the tragic flight. The investigation found operators of charter flights aren't aware of how quickly tires can lose pressure and that the FAA and Learjet Inc. didn't take aggressive enough action to fix a design flaw on this model of jet following a similar accident in 2001. Now that's a shocker!

Proper maintenance is crucial to flight safety - no item is too small when dealing with people's lives. NTSB Chairwoman, Deborah Hersman, stated, "This accident didn't need to happen."

The families of Travis Barker and Charles Still have settled with several companies over the accident and AM's estate settled a $20 million lawsuit in January.