The final conversations

The following are excerpts, released Saturday by the Canada Transportation Safety Board, of conversations among air controllers in Moncton, New Brunswick, and the flight crew of Swissair Flight 111. Material in parenthesis was added by way of explanation.

SWR111 (Swissair Flight 111): Swissair 111 heavy (wide-bodied aircraft) is declaring Pan Pan Pan (an urgent message but not a distress call). We have smoke in the cockpit, request deviate immediate right turn to a convenient place. I guess Boston.

CONTROLLER: Would you prefer to go into Halifax?

SWR111: Affirmative for Swissair 111. . . . Prefer Halifax from our position. (According to the CTSB, Flight 111 was 70 nautical miles from Halifax and 300 nautical miles from Boston at this juncture. Aircraft starts descent from 33,000 feet.)

CONTROLLER: Okay. Active runway at Halifax is zero-six. Should I start you a vector (directional instructions) for six?

SWR111: Yes, vector for six will be fine, Swissair 111 heavy.

CONTROLLER: Turn left heading zero-three-zero.

CONTROLLER: You've got 30 miles to fly to the threshold (start of runway).

SWR111: We need more than 30 miles . . .

CONTROLLER: Turn left . . . lose some altitude . . .

SWR111: Roger, we are turning left . . .

SWR111: We must dump some fuel. We may do that in this area during descent.

CONTROLLER: Okay.

SWR111: Okay, we are able to turn left or right turn toward the south to dump.

CONTROLLER: Roger, turn left heading of 200 degrees and advise me when you are ready to dump . . .

SWR111: We are declaring an emergency at time zero-one-two-four (01:24 a.m. Greenwich Mean Time, 9:24 EDT) We are starting vent (dumping fuel) now. We have to land immediately.

CONTROLLER: Swissair 111, you are cleared to commence your fuel dump on that track and advise me when the dump is completed.

CONTROLLER: Swissair 111, you are cleared to start fuel dump.

(There were no further communications from Swissair Flight 111, the CTSB says. About six minutes later, the aircraft struck the water.)