Desrosiers

Flight International (“Flight”) appeals the judgment of the district court in favor of Herbert Desrosiers and Joshua Rodriguez in a diversity action arising out of a plane crash at Edwards Air Force Base, California. The jury assessed Flight’s comparative fault'for the crash to be forty-two percent. Flight filed a motion for new trial asserting several errors occurred during the trial. The district court denied the motion for new trial and entered judgment on the verdict. This appeal follows.

I. Factual and Procedural Background

Flight International 1 had a three-year, $2.5 million contract with the U.S. government to provide and maintain three aircraft at the U.S. Naval Air Weapons Station in China Lake, California. Under the terms of the contract, Flight was required to provide on-site maintenance and to ensure that personnel assigned to perform maintenance tasks on the aircraft and related components were licensed and qualified.

Equipment required to be maintained under the contract included a dual-display navigational instrument known as the Distance Measuring Equipment (“DME”). The DME is an instrument used to inform the pilot of the distance between the aircraft and a…