LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) — Fifteen new lawsuits were filed Thursday in Jefferson Circuit Court on behalf of more than 100 people seeking damages after the crash of UPS Flight 2976 in Louisville last year.
In a news release Thursday morning, two Louisville law firms announced the new suits, which they said followed "unsuccessful settlement discussions" with the companies.
"I think, ultimately, the buck stops with the entity whose logo is on the plane," Masten Childers III, Kentucky managing partner at Whiteford Law, said Thursday. "... They are severely traumatized."
Among the plaintiffs in the lawsuits are families of the 15 people who died, those who were injured from the path of the crash and nine local businesses that were destroyed, including Grade A Autoparts.
NTSB Preliminary report | Victims identified | What's next
"Behind every lawsuit is a family trying to rebuild their lives and a business trying to pick up the pieces," Justin Peterson, founding partner of Peterson Law, said in the news release. "We're here to make sure they have the resources and support they need to heal."
In a written statement Thursday, UPS said its focus "continues to be on supporting those affected and working with the National Transportation Safety Board as the investigation continues."
The McDonnell Douglas MD-11 cargo plane, built in 1991, went down around 5:15 p.m. after its left wing caught fire. The plane was fully loaded with fuel for the nine-hour flight to Honolulu from UPS Worldport at Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport. Fifteen people, including three pilots, died in the crash.
The NTSB's preliminary report said the plane's left engine caught fire and detached during takeoff. In that report, the agency's investigation revealed the part that secured the engine showed "fatigue cracks" and overstress failure across much of the bearing race inside the area that attached the plane's left engine to its wing. Investigators said the UPS plane got only 30 feet into the air before it crashed and burst into flames, hitting several businesses just south of the airport.
The UPS cargo plane was nearly airborne when a bell sounded in the cockpit, the NTSB said. For the next 25 seconds, the bell rang and the pilots tried to control the aircraft as it barely lifted off the runway, its left wing ablaze and missing an engine, and then plowed into the ground in a spectacular fireball.
The NTSB hearing is scheduled for May 19-20 at its boardroom in Washington, D.C. It will also be streamed live. The agency said it conducts investigative hearings "to assist in obtaining information necessary to determine the facts and circumstances of transportation accidents or incidents under investigation." While the hearing is open to the public, only board members, investigators, witnesses and parties to the hearing are permitted to participate.
Flight records suggest the 34-year-old plane underwent maintenance while it was on the ground in San Antonio for more than a month, from September through mid-October. The Associated Press reported it wasn't clear what work was done. But according to a report by The Wall Street Journal, the plane needed a critical fuel tank repair.
The report cited FAA maintenance records that show the jet needed a permanent repair to fix a crack in the fuel tank before it returned to service. WDRB is working to independently obtain those maintenance records from the FAA.
The federal investigation into the plane crash showed one of the key defects found on the plane's failed engine was a known issue among Boeing's service team, albeit one Boeing didn't believe would lead to a "safety of flight condition."
NTSB investigators then went back into Boeing service data and confirmed the design of the bearing assembly was consistent with the original design of that part. However, a Boeing Service Letter dated Feb. 7, 2011, told operators the company was aware of four previous bearing race failures on three different airplanes. Boeing had seen the fractures of the bearing race, with the parts splitting in two and moving out of place.
However, Boeing told operators its review of the bearing failure "would not result in a safety of flight condition."
Boeing said further regular inspection of MD-11 airplanes would include a look at this bearing assembly, something scheduled for 60-month service intervals. And while Boeing used that service letter to discuss a new bearing assembly configuration, the installation of the original parts "was not prohibited."
UPS and FedEx said they grounded their fleets of McDonnell Douglas MD-11's "out of an abundance of caution." And the Federal Aviation Administration's directive the following day sidelined the planes until inspection and correction of any problems. In January, UPS announced that its fleet of the cargo planes are now officially retired.
"Everybody was on notice that there were problems with these planes," Childers said Thursday. "These companies, these entities, took a calculated risk to continue to operate planes that had known problems with them."
Several lawsuits were filed in the weeks and months after the crash against UPS, General Electric, Boeing and the company that did maintenance on the plane. Those include a lawsuit filed by the widow of one of the plane's pilots.
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