US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said a business jet crashed in a residential area in Florida on Sunday. All nine people on board were killed.
In the recording of conversations with the air traffic control service, one of the crew members can be heard reporting moderate turbulence. After this, the airliner began to rapidly lose altitude and, judging by the published footage, crashed almost vertically into the ground. The governor of Florida compared the crash to a rocket falling.
The crash occurred around 12:50 pm ET (1750 GMT) near Cresthaven, about 14 km from Mar-a-Lago, President Donald Trump's Palm Beach residence.
As stated by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the aircraft took off from Austin, Texas and was heading to the Bahamas.
Duffy called the incident a "terrible tragedy" and said the FAA was sending a team to the scene to assist with the National Transportation Safety Board's (NTSB) investigation.
“This is terrible footage,” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis told reporters. “It looked like a rocket had fallen: a powerful explosion, debris flying everywhere.”
Photo copyright: Reuters
Flight analysis shows that before the fall the airliner was rapidly losing altitude - at a speed of hundreds of feet per second.
In a recording of conversations with air traffic control made shortly before the disaster, one of the crew members can be heard reporting “moderate turbulence” and that the crew was “struggling with icing.” The person then says that the plane is “entering a precipitation zone” and “needs to gain altitude.”
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A moment later, the same voice reports that the plane is descending at a speed of 10 thousand feet (3048 meters) per minute.
A crew member declared an emergency by shouting, “We're over the speed limit, descending at 20,000 feet per minute,” before adding, “We're about to hit the ground.”
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About 35 seconds after the first distress signal, the final phrase was heard from the cockpit: “We have no more time.”
Unconfirmed footage (presumably a DVR recording) appeared on social networks, which captured the moment of the plane crash.
The video shows cars driving down a street in a residential suburban area, and then suddenly an aircraft crashes into the ground - almost vertically - followed by a powerful explosion.
The Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office said the crash occurred on Military Trail, a six-lane highway lined with businesses and restaurants.
It is unclear who was on board the plane. “At this time, we have no information that anyone on the ground has been killed or injured,” the governor said.
At a news conference, DeSantis and local officials said 600 residents were being evacuated from a nearby community where there are trailer homes.
According to them, the accident caused significant damage to local infrastructure, including water networks.
Trump was at Mar-a-Lago on Sunday morning and took off from a nearby airport on Air Force One about an hour before the business jet crashed.
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