 The sole defendant in the lawsuits was Sundstrand Corporation (later Hamilton Sundstrand), the company that designed and manufactured the Mark-II ground proximity warning system ("GPWS") installed on the Airbus 300.The plaintiffs alleged that the GPWS was defectively designed, that the manufacturer was aware of its deficiencies in mountainous terrain for over a decade, and had the system worked as designed the accident could have been avoided.Had the aircraft been fitted with EGPWS the crew would have had the alarm sound between 18 and 23 seconds before impact; the accident would have been avoided.