NATION IN BRIEF : WASHINGTON, D.C. : Fatal Flight Record: Terror, No Clues

The cockpit voice recording of the final seconds of United Airlines Flight 585 contains screams of the crew but little to explain the March 3 crash that killed all aboard the Boeing 737. “Oh, my God! Oh, my God!” co-pilot Patricia Eidson shouted as the jetliner went into a vertical dive. Five crew members and 20 passengers died when the plane crashed three miles short of the Municipal Airport runway at Colorado Springs, Colo. An 800-page National Transportation Safety Board report on the crash published in Washington, D.C., drew no conclusions as to the cause. It did say that twice in the week before the accident crews on the same plane reported “abrupt, uncommanded rudder movement.” In both cases, United made repairs.