A criminal complaint affidavit was filed in federal court against American Airlines mechanic Abdul-Majeed Marouf Ahmed Alani for trying to sabotage a flight from Miami International Airport.
In an interview, Alani admitted that he tampered with the plane’s navigation system because he wanted to collect overtime work amidst the stalled union contract negotiations. The plane had 150 people on board and is bound for Nassau in the Bahamas on July 17.
The pilots received an error message for a system that tracks speed, nose direction and other critical flight information while they were powering up the plane so they decided to abort the takeoff. Mechanics examined the aircraft and discovered that a piece of foam was glued inside the air data module, which was part of the navigation system.
The affidavit states that Alani was identified by co-workers as the person on the surveillance video showing a man driving up to the plane and spent seven minutes working around the compartment containing the navigation system. What gave away Alani was his distinctive limp.
In an interview, federal air marshal Jose A. Ruiz said “Alani stated that his intention was not to cause harm to the aircraft or its passengers." Ruiz added that Alani claims to have tampered with the plane just “to cause a delay or have the flight cancelled in anticipation of obtaining overtime work.” Alani claimed that he was financially hurting due to the stalled contract negotiations between American Airlines and the mechanics' unions.
American Airlines released a statement saying that it was fully cooperative during the investigation and "and we are taking this matter very seriously." The airline also assured that the plane in question was relived from service following the incident and was repaired and inspected before it was placed into service again.
Alani is facing charges of willfully damaging or disabling an aircraft. And is set to appear in a Miami federal court today.
