Learjet crashes near Palm Beach and kills nine; retired pilot sees ice and loss of lift as a hypothesis

A Learjet plunged toward the ground near a busy road in Palm Beach, Florida, the day before, exploding in a ball of fire and killing all nine people on board. According to Fox Business, authorities from the NTSB (American accident investigation body) and the FAA, the civil aviation agency, should give an update on the case in Miami.

The aircraft crashed just a few kilometers from Mar-a-Lago, according to the channel's presentation, which showed air traffic control audio of the final moments of the flight. Governor Ron DeSantis told reporters that the plane fell almost vertically, "like a missile," according to the report.

The expert hypothesis

Retired airline captain Mike Coffield was interviewed on Fox & Friends. He stressed that what he presented is his assessment of what may have happened, and not an official conclusion. According to his reading, the jet was crossing Florida on autopilot, at 37,000 feet, when it entered an area with a lot of ice.

According to Coffield, ice accumulated under the wing and the nose of the aircraft continued to rise, while the trim system tried to maintain the attitude. He associated this with the request for a higher altitude, heard in the audio of the conversation with control. Then, turbulence in the center of a storm cell led to an attempt to raise the nose even higher. At that moment, in his opinion, the plane stalled, that is, the wings stopped generating lift.

Coleman further described that the cell had strong up and down currents. According to him, the wind, loaded with ice, hit the aircraft with a downward current and "literally" pushed it down.

Learjet Stabilizer and History

The presenter cited reports on the internet that the stabilizer had come loose, and asked if Coffield agreed. The pilot said it was possible that the tail stabilizer, responsible for raising or lowering the nose, had gone up, but considered this very unlikely. According to him, the NTSB will examine this point in the final images.

Coffield said the Learjet has been very safe over the years, even though it is a difficult plane to fly, and that there are nine variants of the model. In his opinion, the aircraft is quite resistant to bad weather, but the cell it entered had very strong currents.

What the investigation will examine

The retired pilot listed what the NTSB should analyze: pilots in the last 30 days, training received, rest and training performance. The plane and its maintenance, the weather and what air traffic control told the pilots will also be evaluated.

Coleman also said that the episode should lead to discussions about how to avoid situations of ice accumulation, including with better weather radars, and that this would make aviation safer in the future.

For the investor, the transcript does not contain market, company or economic policy data linked to the accident. What there is, for now, is an expert hypothesis, which has not yet been confirmed by the NTSB, and the official investigation has only just begun.

Automatically translated from Portuguese.