{"id":99239,"date":"2025-12-24T02:10:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-24T02:10:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/99239\/"},"modified":"2025-12-24T02:10:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T02:10:08","slug":"mexican-navy-medical-flight-lost-communication-before-texas-crash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/99239\/","title":{"rendered":"Mexican Navy medical flight lost communication before Texas crash"},"content":{"rendered":"

Air traffic controllers lost communication for about 10 minutes with a small Mexican Navy plane<\/a> carrying a young medical patient and seven others before it crashed off the Texas coast in thick fog<\/a>, killing at least six people, Mexico\u2019s government said Tuesday.<\/p>\n

The plane was working with a nonprofit group transporting Mexican children with severe burns to a hospital in Galveston, near Houston, when the plane crashed Monday afternoon. Authorities believed the plane had landed, but the flight had lost contact with air controllers, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Tuesday in her morning briefing.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"In<\/p>\n

In this image provided by Sky Decker Jr., authorities and volunteers respond to a Mexican Navy plane crash near Galveston, Texas, Monday, Dec. 22, 2025. (Sky Decker Jr. via AP)null<\/p>\n

In this image provided by Sky Decker Jr., authorities and volunteers respond to a Mexican Navy plane crash near Galveston, Texas, Monday, Dec. 22, 2025. (Sky Decker Jr. via AP)null<\/p>\n

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Teams found the dead bodies of five people and pulled two survivors from the plane\u2019s wreckage, then set off on a daylong search in the waters near Galveston for 29-year-old Navy Lieutenant Luis Enrique Castillo. Castillo\u2019s family back in their rural town in southern Mexico were left scrambling for answers, hoping for the best for their missing son.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t know what to do,\u201d his father Eduardo Castillo said Tuesday. \u201cAll we can do is wait. We can\u2019t go to the United States, we have no visa.\u201d <\/p>\n

The search came to an end Tuesday night when search teams found Castillo\u2019s body. American authorities are investigating the the cause, but the National Transportation Safety Board said Tuesday that it could take a week or more to recover the aircraft.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat happened is very tragic,\u201d Sheinbaum said in her morning press briefing, noting that sailors were among the dead. <\/p>\n

Plane was too low as it descended<\/p>\n

As the twin turboprop Beech King Air 350i approached Sholes International Airport in Galveston, radar shows it was far too low, said Jeff Guzzetti, a former NTSB and Federal Aviation Administration crash investigator.<\/p>\n

A navigation system for the runway where the plane was supposed to land had been out of service for about a week, Guzzetti said. The system sends signals to the airplane cockpit that helps pilots navigate in the kind of bad weather that had enveloped the area. The fog was so thick that meteorologists estimated only about a half-mile of visibility. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"In<\/p>\n

In this image provided by Sky Decker Jr., authorities and volunteers respond to a Mexican Navy plane crash near Galveston, Texas, Monday, Dec. 22, 2025. (Sky Decker Jr. via AP)<\/p>\n

In this image provided by Sky Decker Jr., authorities and volunteers respond to a Mexican Navy plane crash near Galveston, Texas, Monday, Dec. 22, 2025. (Sky Decker Jr. via AP)<\/p>\n

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The pilot should have aborted the landing if the runway wasn\u2019t visible at an altitude of 205 feet (62.5 meters), climbing back up before trying again or looking for another airport entirely, Guzzetti said.<\/p>\n

Guzzetti said the reported radar track shows that the pilot was descending rapidly below 200 feet (61 meters), a full 2 miles (3 kilometers) away from the runway.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe there was some sort of mechanical malfunction,\u201d he said. \u201cBut just looking at the recorded flight track and comparing it with the weather and the airport equipment outage, seems to me that this landing approach should never have occurred.\u201d<\/p>\n

Witness describes crash scene<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Galveston<\/p>\n

Galveston Police officers watch the water on Galveston Bay west of the Galveston causeway, Monday, Dec. 22, 2025, near Galveston, Texas, as emergency personnel search for a small airplane that went down in the bay in heavy fog. (Jennifer Reynolds\/The Galveston County Daily News via AP)<\/p>\n

Galveston Police officers watch the water on Galveston Bay west of the Galveston causeway, Monday, Dec. 22, 2025, near Galveston, Texas, as emergency personnel search for a small airplane that went down in the bay in heavy fog. (Jennifer Reynolds\/The Galveston County Daily News via AP)<\/p>\n

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The plane crashed in a bay near the base of the causeway connecting Galveston Island to the mainland. The popular beach destination is about 50 miles (80 kilometers) southeast of Houston.<\/p>\n

Sky Decker, a professional yacht captain who lives near the crash site, said he jumped in his boat to see if he could help. He picked up two police officers who guided him through the thick fog to the nearly submerged plane. Decker jumped into the water and found a badly injured woman trapped beneath chairs and other debris.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe had maybe 3 inches (7.6 centimeters) of air gap to breathe in,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd there was jet fuel in there mixed with the water, fumes real bad. She was really fighting for her life.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said he also pulled out a man seated in front of her who had already died. <\/p>\n

Family left reeling<\/p>\n

Eduardo Castillo gathered with the rest of his family and friends Tuesday afternoon in their small community of El Pantano in the sweltering southern Mexican state of Veracruz. <\/p>\n

The father, who worked long hours as a carpenter to give his son the opportunities he never had, was desperately refreshing his phone every few minutes, looking for any news of their missing son. Mexico\u2019s Marines, he noted, had provided few other details than a call saying their son was missing. <\/p>\n

Framed pictures of Luis Enrique Castillo and his many diplomas coated a wall of their home. He and his wife were expecting a baby due in three months.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday night, Castillo heard his phone ring and answered, hearing the words he had dreaded. His son was dead. <\/p>\n

\u201cNow he\u2019s never going to meet his unborn child,\u201d Eduard Castillo said as his family hugged and sobbed around him. <\/p>\n

Investigators dig into the cause<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for the NTSB said in an email that investigators will review maintenance records, weather forecasts and air traffic control communications. A preliminary report is expected within 30 days.<\/p>\n

Guzzetti said the investigation also will likely look into how serious the young patient\u2019s medical condition was and how motivated the pilot was to land.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere have been previous accidents in the air medical community where pilots try to push their luck in order to save the patient,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The aircraft had a \u201cvery, very proven design,\u201d said aviation safety expert John Cox. He said it\u2019s the latest version of a series that has been in use since the 1960s and would have been outfitted with all the modern electronics, avionics and equipment.<\/p>\n

Plane was helping with medical mission<\/p>\n

Mexico\u2019s Navy said the plane was helping with a medical mission in coordination with the Michou and Mau Foundation. <\/p>\n

The charity was founded after a mother died trying to save her kids from a fire. One child died, while another survived after receiving treatment at Shriners Children\u2019s Texas in Galveston. Over 23 years, the foundation has helped transfer more than 2,000 patients to that hospital and other medical facilities with burn expertise, according to the charity\u2019s website. <\/p>\n

In a social media post, the foundation offered condolences to the families of the crash victims.<\/p>\n

Shriners Children\u2019s Texas said in a statement that it learned of the crash with \u201cprofound sadness\u201d but wasn\u2019t able to provide any information about the child\u2019s condition.<\/p>\n

Crash comes amid focus on aviation safety<\/p>\n

This latest crash comes amid a year of intense scrutiny on aviation safety after a string of high-profile crashes and the flight disruptions<\/a> during the government shutdown driven by the shortage of air traffic controllers. <\/p>\n

The January midair collision between an Army helicopter<\/a> and an airliner near Washington, D.C., was followed by the crash of a medical transport plane<\/a> in Philadelphia. This fall\u2019s fiery UPS plane crash<\/a> only added to the concerns. Still, the total number of crashes in 2025 was actually down a bit from last year, and experts say flying remains safe overall.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Marquez reported from El Pantano and Janetsky reported from Mexico City. Hallie Golden contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Air traffic controllers lost communication for about 10 minutes with a small Mexican Navy plane carrying a young…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":99240,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[23851,5703,45564,45769,7216,490,31376,45770,2277,28061,1468,505,3003,27,29,28,1760,1499],"class_list":["post-99239","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-aviation-safety","tag-central-america","tag-claudia-sheinbaum","tag-eduardo-castillo","tag-galveston","tag-general-news","tag-jeff-guzzetti","tag-john-cox","tag-latin-america","tag-local-news-for-apple","tag-mexico","tag-national-transportation-safety-board","tag-plane-crashes","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news","tag-tx-state-wire","tag-u-s-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99239","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99239"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99239\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/99240"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}