A DECLASSIFIED report on the 1976 Sabah Air crash and released today has stated that the airline was operating illegally at the time the Government Aircraft Factories (GAF) of Australia Nomad went down, killing 11 people including then Sabah chief minister Fuad Stephens.

In the report, GAF said Sabah Air’s operations manual, submitted in 1975, was not approved by the then civil aviation department (CAD).

“In this regard, Sabah Air was operating illegally,” said the report, declassified by the Australian government.

GAF said, during the course of investigations, it found a “singularly poor operation” on the part of Sabah Air and a “failure on the part of the CAD” to fulfil its obligations as the local certification authority.

“In the subsequent paragraphs of this section, this information is detailed as relevant to the accident because as will clearly be seen, an accident was bound to happen sooner or later,” GAF said.

The Sabah Air-operated GAF N22 Nomad crashed while attempting to land at Kota Kinabalu Airport on June 6, 1976.

Along with Fuad, the crash claimed the lives of ministers Peter Mojuntin Salleh Sulong and Chong Thien Vun, assistant minister Darius Binion, state Finance Ministry permanent secretary Wahid Peter Andau, Fuad’s bodyguard Said Mohammad, Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah’s private secretary Isak Atan, pilot Gandhi Nathan, and Fuad’s son Johari Stephens.

Earlier this month, the government declassified its findings into the crash, having been held under the Official Secrets Act for 47 years.

The final report, signed by then accidents chief inspector and CAD flight operations director Omar Saman, revealed no evidence of sabotage.

The report concluded that the probable cause of the crash was the centre of gravity (CG) position well outside the aft limit, with which GAF concurred in its report today.

Investigations determined that, with the CG too far to the rear of the aircraft, the nose would continually try to pitch upward, an unstable flight mode exacerbated when flaps were engaged for landing at Kota Kinabalu Airport, pushing the plane’s flight controls to the limit.

The GAF report was declassified after an application by former Sabah chief minister Harris Mohd Salleh’s lawyers.

It went on to say that the location of the baggage had merely been “eye-balled” during loading and it had not been weighed.

GAF concurred with the Malaysian report in apportioning some blame to Gandhi, whom it said had substandard skills on this aircraft type. – April 26, 2023.