"I believe that the cause as it stands (in the Chief Inspector's report) is reasonable. As I attempted to clarify last time the pilot has descended to 2000 ft and evidently is unable to see anything ahead. I say 'evidently' because there is a snow slope leading to a mountain rising to 12 450 feet and that was directly in front of him. He 'popped down', to use his own words, another 500 feet and continued to progress towards an ice cliff which is 300 feet high, the lower 50 per cent of which is solid and bare rock. And still he didn't perceive anything to persuade him to divert from his track. To me this indicates it was an area of poor definition and as such he would not be able to discern what he could expect to see had he been, as various people suppose, believing that he was proceeding down the McMurdo Sound. The sea ice is by no means uniform in texture and during his descent he would have seen the nature of the sea ice--in fact the photos from the passengers indicate that it had large breaks in its surface and was quite easily discerned so therefore I believe at the end of his descent to 2000 ft he was confronted with a very vague area in front of him which he may or may not have believed was cloud, and when descending a further 500 feet the view ahead of him would have been of equally poor definition. Despite this, he continued to the point of 26 miles from destination as indicated presumably on the AINS." Mr. Chippindale's opinion has some background relevance in the present case. It is in no way relevant because it differs from that of the Commissioner upon the issue of causation. Already we have emphasized and we do so once again that what was said in the Royal Commission Report about the cause or causes of the accident must stand entirely unaffected by these proceedings. But the opinion has some relevance because although it was wrong, as the Royal Commission Report decided, the Commissioner certainly did not consider it to be anything other than a completely conscientious and honest attempt by Mr. Chippindale to analyse and draw a rational conclusion from all the available facts. He described Mr. Chippindale as a model witness. In the circumstances it is difficult to understand why the same point of view Mr. Chippindale expressed in his evidence could not be genuinely shared by other educated observers. We turn now to the relief sought by these various officers and the airline itself. The Claim for Relief