Concorde disaster trial starts today

It will consider if an abandoned scrap of metal on the runway was

really the main culprit, as French investigators insist.

Prosecutors argue the plane would never have crashed in July 2000 – killing 113 – if a preceding Continental Airlines DC-10 had not dropped a piece of titanium onto the Charles de Gaulle airport runway.

Lawyers for Continental say the American airline is simply a scapegoat and a fire broke out on the Concorde eight seconds before it even reached the titanium strip.

The trial, being held in Pontoise, north of Paris, is expected 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.

Continental and two of its US employees are on trial for manslaughter. Both aviation and judicial investigators have said the metal strip on the runway was the primary cause of the accident. Three former French officials also face charges; judicial investigators say they had long failed to fix the Concorde's vulnerable spots.