Ceren Necipoğlu

Turkish harpist and music educator (18 January 1973, Istanbul, Turkey — 1 June 2009, Atlantic Ocean | Bu. ◚ 24 November 2011, Kanlıca Cemetery, Istanbul). Fatma Ceren Necipoğlu had a distinguished performing career and served as a piano and harp lecturer at the Anadolu University in Eskişehir. She tragically died, only 36 years old, in a plane crash aboard Air France's Flight 447. (The catastrophe had no survivors, claiming 228 lives, including Sílvio Barbato (1959—2009), a distinguished Italian-Brazilian opera conductor.) Several contemporary composers dedicated works to Necipoğlu's memory, such as Marcus Siqueira's Fantasia Ricercare, Desolate Children by Hasan Uçarsu, and Berkant Gençkal's Three Songs for Harp, cello, percussion and Mezzo-soprano based on Edgar Allan Poe's lyrics. American composer Garrett Byrnes, who authored Ceren's obituary in The American Harp Journal, also dedicated Meditation for Harp and String Orchestra (2010; rev 2015) to her. Ceren Necipoğlu began playing harp at high school, attending masterclasses at Istanbul University and City Conservatory. She studied at Boğaziçi University between 1992 and 97, graduating with Bachelor's degree. Necipoğlu continued her education in the USA, earning a diploma from Louisiana State University (1999) and Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University in 2001. In May 2009, Ceren Necipoğlu gave two recitals at the fourth Rio Harp Festival in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. On returning to Istanbul, Fatma boarded a fateful Air France Flight 447 to Paris, served by an Airbus A330 passenger jet. Shortly after 2AM, only eight minutes after a pilot's routine "turbulence ahead" warning, the airplane crashed into the Atlantic Ocean surface, instantly killing all 12 crew members and 216 passengers. It became the deadliest crash in Air France's history and only the second fatal accident in Airbus A330's 17 years of service. The plane had three pilots on duty; however, by tragic coincidence, the captain was on his mandatory break, resting away from the cockpit and leaving the least experienced crew member in charge. After hitting the turbulence and extreme icing conditions, the airplane's "pitot tube" sensors (detecting the airspeed) got clogged up with ice crystals. (Apparently, it was a long-known defect, and the specific make and model from US manufacturer Goodrich Sensors & Integrated Systems that came on Airbus A330 had already been recalled in 2001 and 2007. By another twist of fate, a recall notice wasn't mandatory due to bureaucratic oversight). Malfunctioning sensors led to inconsistent speed readings, forcing the plane's autopilot and "engine auto-thrust" systems to disengage. The inexperienced pilot who took over began to climb and accelerate, trying to adjust for the non-existent loss of altitude indicated by glitching instruments. Instead, he forced the plane to stall with its nose pointing upwards. By the time panicking crew summoned the commander to the deck, it was too late, and the pilots failed to recover the jet.