Investigators Recover Key Piece Of Evidence From Deadly Florida Jet Crash

Investigators have recovered the cockpit voice recorder from the deadly Learjet crash that killed all nine people onboard in Florida.

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said Monday that the cockpit voice recorder was found at the site of the crash. The recorder could help investigators determine what went wrong on the Learjet 60 before it slammed nose-first into the street in South Florida.

“The [cockpit voice recorder] is being evaluated in the NTSB Vehicle Recorders Laboratory in Washington, D.C. The excavation work at the impact site has been completed,” the NTSB said.

National Transportation Safety Board

The NTSB is expected to issue a preliminary report on the crash in December.

NTSB member Tom Chapman said the investigation will focus on looking into how the pilots and air-traffic controllers determined the plane would fly into thunderstorms that were in the area at the time of the crash.

“The factual details of how this transpired is exactly what we’re trying to determine,” Chapman said. “Who knew what and when and what actions were taken and whether those actions were appropriate.”

The agency aims to complete full investigations within one to two years of a crash. 

The private jet was piloted by Jeff Gregory, 55, and Nathalia Gadelha Filgueiras, 20. Previously released air traffic control audio revealed the pilots were battling turbulence and “light, clear ice.” Filgueiras asked air traffic controllers if there was a better route in the area and asked for permission to climb. Over the roughly one-minute recording, the situation rapidly deteriorated, with Filgueiras issuing a mayday call and reporting a descent rate of 20,000 feet per minute.

Video footage from a nearby dash cam showed the private jet hitting the ground nose-first before exploding into a fireball and leaving a massive crater. Witnesses nearby said the crash sounded “like a missile.” 

DeWitt Ingram, a Learjet type-rated captain, said severe turbulence inside a thunderstorm could have damaged the aircraft and caused the pilots to lose control.

“If the pilot flew into the tops of one of the thunderstorms, in that very rough air, he could have damaged the airplane to the point where he lost control,” he said. 

“The airplane was seen to have entered a very powerful, isolated thunderstorm that was high as to where that airplane was flying,” Jeff Guzzetti, a former top U.S. aircraft accident investigator told The Wall Street Journal. “Typically, these business jets can fly over the weather. But in this case, this weather was building up so much that it was reaching some very high altitudes.”

The flight took off from Austin-Bergstrom International Airport in Texas and was headed for the Bahamas when it flew into thunderstorms. Along with Gregory and Filgueiras, tech entrepreneur Adam Robinson, his wife Helen Sharp, their two young children, the family’s nanny Anita Maria Cetina, and the couple’s friends, Rachael Reed and Charmi Fehr, all died in the crash.

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