Cyrano Latiff in the left seat of an AirAsia Airbus A320.
In 1964 a Singaporean man of Javanese descent named Latiff saw a film poster of a swashbuckling character played by Oscar-winning actor José Ferrer and was so captivated by the ravishing musketeer that he named his newborn son after the movie’s hero.
The film was Cyrano et d’Artagnan, about two French swordsmen who ganged up to prevent a plot against the king, Louis XIII.
Today there is absolutely no doubt in Cyrano Latiff’s mind that his father was a maverick, a man ahead of his time.
“He’s my hero,” says Cyrano. “He dared to be different. A man with no formal education, who earned extra money as a caddy, and then married a Chinese woman 16 years his junior – inter-racial marriage unheard of then!”
It has been 40 years since we last met, and by chance were reconnected in May this year, courtesy of a mutual friend.
We were both A-level students (he a year older) at St Andrew’s Junior College, then located along leafy Alexandra Road in Singapore.
Cyrano went on to study botany and zoology at the National University of Singapore, joined the army for several years before fulfilling his desire to fly by becoming a pilot with Singapore Airlines.
And so the wannabe biologist became an aviator.
“I had been keen (on flying) since secondary school. I failed to get into the junior flying club scheme and then failed again to get into the Republic of Singapore Air Force as a fighter pilot.”
However, it was third time lucky when he was accepted into SIA, aged 30.
Little did he know his luck would end six years later.
Xangsane, PVD and all that palaver
The hospital card issued to Cyrano Latiff when he was sent to hospital following the crash of SQ006.
As a first officer of SQ006 (SIN-TPE-LAX) Cyrano was one of three flight crew members who were on the ill-fated SIA Boeing 747-400 which hit construction equipment on a partially shut runway at Taipei’s Chiang Kai-shek airport (now known as Taoyuan International) on the night of 31 October 2000.
The plane broke into three pieces, 83 passengers and crew perished and all that was left – when morning broke and the carnage became clearer – were mangled pieces of burnt seats, baggages and body parts.
Time may have helped to heal but 22 years later, Cyrano recollects it vividly.
He recalls the moment of impact, the sound of screeching metal and, once the aircraft stopped spinning, the darkness.
And how he fought to stay alive.
He remembers leaping out from the upper deck door of the aircraft – “my leap of faith” – and landing onto the tarmac, suffering lacerations to his right palm that needed stitches.
But his pain had only just begun.
He and his two cockpit colleagues remained in Taipei for 52 days while investigations and legal proceedings were conducted and when they returned to Singapore their movements were limited for two years.
At the time of incident typhoon Xangsane (Laotian for elephant) was fast approaching Taiwan, reducing visibility and slowing the movement of the aircraft as it taxied along.
Taiwan’s Aviation Safety Council determined the crew of SQ006 had neglected to check the para visual display (PVD) which, it claimed, would have shown the plane was lined up on the wrong runway.
The ASC apportioned blame on SQ006’s flight crew for, among other things, not taking off from the right runway and for losing situational awareness.
The ASC’s findings were challenged by Singapore authorities.
Its own findings suggested infrastructure at the airport’s runway did not meet international standards and that the plane was cleared for takeoff when air traffic control was unable to see the jet due to low visibility as well as the absence of ground radar.
Singapore’s Ministry of Transport said systems, procedures and facilities at the airport were “seriously inadequate.”
That said, both Cyrano and the captain of SQ006, Foong Chee Kong, left SIA in 2002 despite investigations concluding they had not contravened any regulation or operational procedures.
Coincidentally the two airmen later resurrected their flying careers at AirAsia.
Not being put off flying…
The film poster in 1964 which inspired Cyrano’s father.
One might think that having experienced a plane crash would put people, whether as a pilot or passenger, off flying altogether.
This, however, varies from person to person.
There’s the famous case of the former Dutch international footballer Dennis Bergkamp who had a special clause inserted in his contract while playing for Arsenal that he would not be forced to fly for games played outside of England, at the expense of a slice of his salary.
Bergkamp was spooked from flying many years ago while playing for Ajax following an incident that killed some of his friends.
Cyrano admitted his life following SQ006 was anything but smooth and credited his family and faith for helping him regain his emotional and mental strength.
Following his decade-long stint at AirAsia, where he rose to become captain, the 58-year-old is now fully immersed in academia and the development of the young at institutions in Singapore.
He says even in his darkest days he never really thought of giving up flying or doing non-aviation stuff.
And each year on 31 October he goes about life like “any other day… nothing extraordinary, just that I’m aware it’s a significant date in my life’s journey.”
Flying is the safest mode of transportation and many pilots we know consider a crash as just one of the hazards of their profession.
Indeed, we’ve heard and read many times of planes being described as metal tubes that just happen to fly.
Pilots and (some) passengers acknowledge that, in spite of state-of-the-art technology and innovation put into aircraft recently, things could still go wrong.
Is the theory of probability on your side once you’ve encountered an air disaster and survived?
Cyrano, who lived through a nightmare most of us will never fully understand, doesn’t quite see it that way.
He shares that when one of his four children wanted to be a flight attendant, he was fully supportive of it, even though SQ006 caused the deaths of four of the airline’s cabin crew.
Whilst the loss of lives from that accident – and how it continues to affect families – remain a constant in his mind, he says he is at peace with himself and is grateful he has the chance to contribute to making the industry even safer.
Endau Analytics 