U.S. team in China to inspect spy plane

BEIJING, China (CNN) -- A U.S. technical team landed Tuesday in China to examine a Navy surveillance plane grounded there for a month.

The aircraft has been stranded on Hainan Island since a collision with a Chinese fighter jet. China has not yet agreed to return the plane, but has allowed U.S. officials to inspect it.

RESOURCES China made its own animation showing their version of the incident Play video (QuickTime, Real or Windows Media) This computer animation shows how the Pentagon says the collision between a U.S. plane and a Chinese fighter happened Play video (QuickTime, Real or Windows Media) Timeline: Overnight calls brought word of release deal    IN-DEPTH U.S.-China Collision: A diplomatic solution  • About freighter returning EP-3  • Look: Inside the EP-3  • Facts about the EP-3  • Map: Locating the incident  • Big picture: High stakes  • Classroom discussion guide  • Historical US-China timeline  • Whidbey arrival images  • Crew speaks out  • Crew's return images   CNN AFFILIATES WKMG TV, Orlando   • Spy plane crewman back home

Most of the team members are from the aircraft's builder, Lockheed Martin. They will assess the extent of repairs needed to fly the plane off the island.

A Pentagon official told CNN, on condition of anonymity, that the Chinese were expected to give the team access to the plane "by the end of the week."

The plane landed on Hainan on April 1, after it collided with a Chinese fighter jet shadowing the routine surveillance mission over the South China Sea.

China detained the 24-member U.S. crew for 11 days, until Washington said it was "very sorry" for the death of the Chinese pilot and for the crew's landing on Hainan without verbal clearance from controllers there.

"In my view, getting the crew out was the most important," U.S. Ambassador Joseph Prueher said Tuesday. "The airplane is sort of a corrosive element right now in our relationship, a reminder of the hard spots. We need to clean that up and get on with things."

U.S.-Chinese talks meant to resolve the lingering dispute over the spy plane ended without result last month. Observers viewed China's decision to allow the inspection as a conciliatory gesture.

China says the United States must take responsibility for the collision and believe the accident was caused by the surveillance plane's maneuvers. U.S. officials blame what they call the Chinese pilot's aggressive tactics in shadowing the slower, less-maneuverable spy plane over the South China Sea.

An EP-3 aircraft like the one stranded on China's Hainan Island

The inspection team will likely take two days to assess the plane's engines, airframe, power plant, electronics and fuel systems, said Lt. Col. Stephen Barger, a U.S. Pacific Command spokesman. The contractors also will determine whether it is capable of being repaired and flown out of China or if another method of transport will have to be used, he said.

The team is not able to make the repairs themselves, Barger said.

Correspondent Lisa Rose Weaver contributed to this report.

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Embassy of the People's Republic of China in the United States of America
U.S. Navy factfile: The EP-3
U.S. Dept of Defense
White House
Government Information Office, Republic of China

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