British gov't agency finds no technical failure in North Sea helicopter crash

No evidence of a "causal technical failure" was found in relation to last month's helicopter crash off Shetland into North Sea, said the British government's Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) on Thursday.

The AAIB special bulletin said that, to date, the agency have uncovered no evidence of technical failure in the Super Puma helicopter which crashed on August 23 and killed four of the oil workers on board, the online Scotsman newspaper reported.

However, AAIB headquarters in Farnborough in England are continuing detailed investigations, including analysis of the cockpit flight data recorder, recovered from the crash scene last week, said the report.

Flights of Super Pumas over the North Sea were allowed to resume last week amid controversy and the British Civil Aviation Authority said there was no evidence to suggest the disaster had been caused by "an airworthiness or technical problem."

After the deadly crash in August, there were doubts of safety function of the helicopter model as several Super Puma accidents took place in the same area in North Sea in recent years.

Helicopters are often used by energy companies to ferry workers back and forth from rigs to explore large deposits of oil and gas in the North Sea.