In article 7,
Robert Moore wrote:

Mike Ash wrote
The NTSB places the blame for the crash on "The pilots' inadequate
planning, judgment, and airmanship". Again, I'm not a lawyer, but I'd
bet that this is more than enough to place the legal liability for
damages squarely on the pilots. It certainly lines up with my personal
sense of right and wrong: you break it, you buy it.

Nope!! Legally can't be done.....

NTSB Reports in Court.
NTSB reports cannot be used as evidence in court. More accurately, facts
from the report may be used, but opinions may not. There are two reasons
for this policy. First, the integrity of the NTSB’s investigation may be
compromised if final reports were used as evidence. Second, the autonomy of
the jury must be maintained during civil proceedings.

If NTSB reports were used as evidence, some witnesses may be less
forthcoming with information during the investigative process and could
compromise the quality of the report by giving a more desired answer
instead of an accurate answer to questions being asked of them.
Additionally, the NTSB and the people involved with the report could be
summoned to court to testify, which would prevent them from performing
their normal investigative duties.

Good to know, thanks.

However, I think my ultimate line of thought still works. If the NTSB
can conclude this from the facts, the court can too. This crash seems to
be fairly clearly the pilot's fault, whoever it happened to be at the
time. The one tricky part is where they assign blame to both, but I
don't personally see a problem with that either. Civil suits have a much
lower standard of proof, after all, and placing responsibility for
damages on the ground on both of the qualified pilots occupying the
cockpit seems justified to me.

--
Mike Ash
Radio Free Earth
Broadcasting from our climate-controlled studios deep inside the Moon