When a Marine Corps jet hit a ski lift in northern Italy two weeks ago, killing 20 people, the pilot was violating orders to fly 1,000 feet above the ground and had veered into an area that the Italian Government says was both off course and off limits for this flight.
It was the crew's first flight through the pristine Alpine valley, framed by mountains and dotted with tiny villages and ski slopes. But the pilot of the EA-6B Prowler did not have Italian military charts provided to his commanders that marked the ski lift, which is also clearly noted on road maps.
Instead the Pentagon, whose policy is not to use maps made by foreign countries, had given the crew an American military chart that did not show the ski-lift cable, which was built 31 years ago from Cavalese, on the valley floor, south to the top of Mount Cermis.
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