Engine Failure Blamed in Woman’s Fatal Jet Crash : Probe: Navy’s report rules out pilot error in death of Lt. Kara Hultgreen. She was the first female qualified to fly the F-14.

The fatal crash of Navy Lt. Kara S. Hultgreen, the first woman qualified to fly the F-14A fighter, was caused by mechanical failure when one of the jet’s engines stalled while Hultgreen was attempting a carrier landing, the Navy announced Tuesday.

Rear Adm. Jay B. Yakeley told a packed news conference at North Island Naval Air Station that all the reasons for the engine stalling will never be known but one probable cause is the failure of an air valve to open.

The failure occurred “at the most critical phase of landing on a carrier,” just as Hultgreen’s F-14 had banked left, was approaching the ramp and needed extra power, Yakeley said. A videotape of the crash taken from the deck of the carrier showed that only four seconds elapsed between the engine failure and the plane being in extremis , or out of control.

After the fatal crash Oct. 25, the Navy went to unusual lengths to recover Hultgreen’s body and salvage the wreckage of the $40-million plane, which had sunk in 3,800 feet of water about 50 miles off the San Diego coast.

The effort was prompted partly by media accounts that repeated anonymous allegations, supposedly from other pilots, that the 29-year-old Hultgreen crashed because she was not qualified to pilot the F-14 but had been given preferential treatment so she could qualify for advancement as part of the Navy’s decision to allow women to fly combat planes.

But after reviewing film of the crash, interviewing Hultgreen’s radar officer and the landing signal officers aboard the Abraham Lincoln, and examining the plane’s engines, Navy investigators concluded that mechanical failure, not pilot error, caused the crash.

“Those of us who knew Kara, those of us who flew with her or had seen her fly, knew she was fully qualified,” Yakeley said. “To those who anonymously claim otherwise, I find that cowardly.”

The finding is consistent with similar investigations of other crashes involving the F-14, which is known to be prone to engine stalling. Other F-14s are being inspected to spot valve problems, said Yakeley, a veteran F-14 pilot who commands the battle group that includes the Abraham Lincoln.

Hultgreen, the first woman pilot to qualify for the F-14 after the Pentagon lifted the ban on women flying combat aircraft, was a member of the Black Lions Squadron at Miramar Naval Air Station in San Diego.

“We in the Navy grieve the loss of any of our young men and women, Lt. Hultgreen, particularly so, because she was a pioneer in naval aviation and she had such a bright future,” Yakeley said.

The tape of the crash shows the split-second nature of carrier aviation, in which a fraction of a second can be deadly.

On orders from the landing signal officers aboard the carrier, the F-14’s radar intercept officer, Lt. Matthew Klemish, ejected as the plane began to quickly roll over and descend nose-first into the water.

His ejection was horizontal to the water and his parachute had time to open and provide a modicum of safety before he hit the water. He suffered only minor injuries.

Hultgreen ejected four-tenths of a second later and was killed instantly. In that four-tenths of a second, the plane had continued to roll and Hultgreen ejected directly into the water.

On the F-14, the same button ejects both aviators, the radar officer or “backseater” first, then the pilot.

The Hultgreen case provides new evidence of two facts of modern life: One, that carrier aviation, even in peacetime, is dangerous. And two, that the media is increasingly willing to repeat rumors and anonymous allegations and to be influenced by talk radio shows where the standards for checking facts are different than those of mainstream journalism.

The allegations about Hultgreen’s alleged shortcomings as a pilot, contained in a fax sent anonymously to news organizations the day after the crash, were first broadcast on a San Diego talk radio show and later repeated in stories by other news organizations, including the New York Times.

Asked about the press coverage of the Hultgreen case, Ben Bagdikian, professor emeritus at the Graduate School of Journalism at UC Berkeley, said that in an era of talk shows, tabloid television and sophisticated media manipulation, news organizations have to be careful not to be goaded by competitive pressures into repeating anonymous allegations that may prove to be false.

“Too many people have too many ways to stimulate a story without facts,” said Bagdikian, former managing editor for news at the Washington Post and later that paper’s ombudsman. “Anonymous faxes are one way. Talk shows are another, where if someone says something often enough, suddenly it’s news.”