Pilot hummed Elvis just before crash

TWO pilots who joked and laughed moments before their aircraft crashed on take-off at Pau airport are under investigation for involuntary manslaughter.

Cockpit voice recorders reveal one of the pilots was humming Elvis Presley moments before the aircraft careered off the runway, struck a service lorry – killing the driver instantly – and came to rest in a field outside the airport perimeter.

Fifty passengers were on board the Fokker 100 – operated by Air France affiliate airline Regional - when the accident occurred on January 25, 2007 but none was injured.

The two pilots, aged 46 and 39 have three months to supply information to the investigating judge and the public prosecutor.

Among the subjects under investigation include the general atmosphere in the cockpit at take off; the verification that the wings and engines had been de-iced and the lack of attention paid to a flock of nearby birds.

The judge has three options; to drop the case, ask for more information or to charge the men.

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The lawyer for the family of the dead lorry driver Michel Coupau, 53 said: "This sad dossier illustrates just how much Air France was right to criticise recently the over-confidence of its pilots.

"It would have been better to concentrate on standard procedures than humming Elvis on that day because Michel Coupau would still be among us," he added.

Photo: An Air France Fokker 100, similar to the one that crashed operated by Regional.