<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by richard:
It doesn't mean Airbus was negligent.
The tails of any airplane can snap off. I would want to know, is the design that Airbus used particularly suspect to snapping off, more so than other airplanes, and is it such a hazard?</font>
If Airbus knew about the defect, or even about the potential of this defect, and covered it up, then in the US they will lose billions of Euros in liability suits. Probably hundreds of billions. (It does not matter whether the defect was "their" fault or not, but the cover-up matters deeply.)
The airline may also be responsible, but as we have seen, bankruptcy is not such an ordeal for airlines.