GREENACRES, Fla. —
Investigators announced Monday they had recovered the cockpit voice recorder from the Learjet crash in Greenacres on Nov. 1, which killed all nine people on board.
The National Transportation Safety Board released photos late Monday afternoon showing the orange case containing the so-called black box. The NTSB hopes the device will shed light on what caused the crash.
“It’s more information, and more information is always good in an investigation,” said John Gagliano, a former Navy pilot and licensed aviation lawyer.
Gagliano explained that the black box contains a cockpit voice recorder, which captures all conversations in the cockpit.
“We get some insight into what was going on in the cockpit. We already have some because the co-pilot was transmitting out to air traffic control,” Gagliano said.
Recordings of those transmissions were released shortly after the crash.
In those transmissions, the co-pilot, Nathalia Gadelha Filgueiras, can be heard giving updates as the plane began to malfunction.
“We are descending from 22,000 feet,” Filgueiras said in one transmission. “And we are banking.”
Gagliano said there were conversations had in the cockpit that were not transmitted.
It’s those conversations that might shed light on what caused the crash.
“They might have been talking to each other about things that they were seeing, things that they were doing, a checklist they were considering.”
The NTSB has taken the cockpit voice recorder to its Vehicle Recorders Laboratory in Washington, D.C., where they will analyze the data.
Gagliano noted that whether the recordings are intact remains uncertain, as the box could have been damaged in the crash. However, he emphasized that these devices are designed to survive impacts like this.
At this point, there is no timeline for when the NTSB may determine the cause of the crash.
Officials confirmed that excavation work at the impact site on Military Trail has been completed.
Meanwhile, Palm Beach County officials announced today that residents of the mobile home park near the crash site in Greenacres can now return home. They also said that people living in the Greenacres Community Center who cannot return home due to damage have been provided temporary housing.
Military Trail remains closed between 10th Avenue North and Cresthaven Boulevard.
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