Kathy,

If the damage 7 years ago was enough to introduce a slight flaw in the metal/composite, and the number of cycles that aircaft did over the next few years furthered the weakening, then yes.

It looks like the buffeting by the adjacent 747 was enough to cause the flaw to "break", in other words the event that caused the failure.

This is the first failure of the tail section so AA and Airbus probably never thought to inspect for the flaw in question. The FAA has ordered inspections, so hopefully if the same flaw exists on other aircraft, it will be caught before another one goes down.

There is also the chance that this was a fluke. Severe turbulence 7 years ago introduced a flaw in the tail section of this particular aircraft. The damage went undetected for 7 years, all the time getting worse, until the aircraft encountered stress that forced the flaw to break.


[This message has been edited by skofarrell (edited 11-17-2001).]