A four-month trial over the Air France Concorde crash 10 years ago will begin today.


The French investigators' finding that an abandoned scrap of metal on the runway at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris caused the supersonic jet to crash in a ball of flames shortly after take-off, killing a total of 113 people, will be scrutinised and debated at the long-awaited hearing.

Prosecutors say the supersonic passenger jet would not have crashed in July 2000 if a Continental Airlines DC-10 had not dropped a piece of titanium on to runway minutes before the Concorde took off.


But Continental lawyer Olivier Metzner says the American airline is simply a convenient scapegoat and will argue that a fire broke out on the Concorde eight seconds before it reached the titanium strip.


The case marks the only crash of a Concorde, an accident that brought heartache and humiliation to a nation proud of its aviation marvel, a jet that could fly across the Atlantic in half the time of other airliners.


The trial is expected to last four months as the court in Pontoise, north of Paris, tries to pin down who should be held criminally responsible for the crash, which killed 109 people on the plane, mostly German tourists, and four people on the ground.


Both aviation and judicial investigators have said the metal strip on the runway was the primary cause of the accident and Continental Airlines, based in Houston, Texas, and two of its US employees are on trial for manslaughter.


Three former French officials also face the same charge. Judicial investigators said they had long failed to fix the Concorde's vulnerable spots.


Money is not a major issue, since the victims' families accepted settlements long ago, neither is the plane's airworthiness.


The jet was retired by both Air France and British Airways in 2003. Concordes are now on display in museums, relics from a time when supersonic flight seemed like the future of air travel.


Aviation officials will nonetheless watch the trial closely.


Virginia-based Flight Safety Foundation argues that criminal trials such as this one - standard practice in France for such accidents - are harmful because they discourage industry officials from sharing important safety information, fearful that what they disclose could be used later to prosecute them.


"I see absolutely no useful purpose served in bringing a criminal prosecution a decade later on a set of facts that suggests nothing more than an aviation tragedy that has multiple mistakes and human errors, like so many others," said Kenneth Quinn, the foundation's general counsel.


In the years after the Concorde crashed, both French aviation and judicial investigators concluded that the DC-10's titanium piece - known as a wear strip - gashed the Concorde's tyre, sending pieces of rubber into the fuel tanks, which caused a fire.


But Continental lawyer Mr Metzner says he plans to present evidence from about 20 witnesses who say they spotted a small fire aboard the Concorde before it reached the titanium strip. He says investigators remained stubbornly fixated on the DC-10's debris.


Mr Metzner says he will ask for the proceedings to be called off, arguing that the document ordering the trial did not provide counterweights to the accusations against Continental, as is required.


Investigators "preferred not to call the Concorde into question, not to call Air France into question, that's why they were satisfied with the ideal culprit, which was Continental Airlines", Mr Metzner said.


He said the supersonic jet was generally fragile and that particular Concorde was in no condition to fly that day because it was overloaded and lacked a piece to stabilise its wheels.


Air France confirmed the piece was missing but said neither that nor extra weight were factors in the crash.


The French carrier is not accused of wrongdoing and has joined the case as a civil party. It considers itself a victim because of expenses stemming from the accident and damage to its image, lawyer Fernard Garnault said. He said the company hoped to obtain damages from Continental.

AP