Data Suggests Struggle in Cockpit Before Deadly China Eastern Plane Crash

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Source: New York Times

Data Suggests Struggle in Cockpit Before Deadly China Eastern Plane Crash

A report by the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board offers new details about the China Eastern Airlines crash in 2022, which killed all 132 people on board.


Emergency workers searching for the black box at the crash site of the China Eastern flight in Teng County, China in 2022. Jiang Huaipeng/Xinhua, via Associated Press

By James Glanz
https://www.nytimes.com/by/james-glanz
May 7, 2026, 10:20 a.m. ET

For more than four years, the final moments of China Eastern Flight 5735 remained shrouded in secrecy, with few clues to a baffling descent from 29,000 feet that left no survivors. ... Now, new data from the Boeing 737 suggests the crash was no accident. The plane's fatal dive was a deliberate act initiated from within the cockpit, aviation experts say, following what appears to have been a struggle for control of the aircraft.

The plane, which was operated by highly experienced pilots, had been traveling from Kunming, in southwestern China, to Guangzhou when it plunged almost vertically into a hillside, driving pieces of the aircraft as deep as 60 feet into the earth. ... The report by the National Transportation Safety Board shows that the dive began when a pilot or pilots pressed the cutoff levers -- essentially, fuel switches -- for both engines on the plane mid-flight, according to Jeff Guzzetti, a former accident investigator for the Federal Aviation Administration and the N.T.S.B.

Pressing down the two levers simultaneously stopped fuel flow to the engines and shut them down, Mr. Guzzetti said. ... Almost immediately, data from the cockpit controls show, the plane entered a terrifying dive and spun in at least one 360-degree roll, Mr. Guzzetti said. The data shows that control wheels in the cockpit -- one each in front of the captain and first officer -- were turned to produce that roll, Mr. Guzzetti said. (The control wheels on a plane are a little like the steering wheels in a car, but they cause the plane to bank.)

The herky-jerky, back-and-forth movement of the wheels suggests that at least two people were fighting to turn them in different directions. That could mean two pilots were struggling over a single wheel or that the captain and first officer were pushing in different directions on their own wheels, which are set to move in unison.

{snip}

Chris Buckley contributed reporting.

James Glanz is a Times international and investigative reporter covering major disasters, conflict and deadly failures of technology.
https://www.nytimes.com/by/james-glanz

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/07/world/asia/china-eastern-plane-crash-flight-5735-ntsb.html