CHEEKTOWAGA, N.Y. " Jonathan Collopy was left with one question after watching investigators spend hours Tuesday dissecting what happened to Continental Connection Flight 3407 before it crashed, killing 50 people.
"They said it could have been saved. So why didn't they save it?" Collopy asked.
About two dozen people who lost relatives or friends in the Feb. 12 crash gathered to watch a simulcast of the National Transportation Safety Board's public hearing into the accident.
As the day's often dry description of the tragedy played out on a 10-foot screen in a hotel ballroom near Buffalo Niagara International Airport, where the plane was headed, most displayed little emotion.
But testimony pointing to shortcomings of the pilot left Karen Kuwik "livid." The retired teacher said she taught every child the way she would have wanted her own child taught. She said the airline should have done the same, hiring pilots they would want safeguarding their own families.
NTSB documents, released Tuesday, included mixed reviews of Captain Marvin Renslow's training on the aircraft's management system.
Airlines are required to show such hearings in the cities where downed flights originate and are bound for. At a simulcast in Elizabeth, N.J., Anna Marie Russo observed the final moments of Flight 3407 in animation while reading transcripts of cockpit voice recorder tapes.