Plane that crashed in Maine spent more time on runway than recommended after deicing, NTSB says

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — A private jet that crashed in Maine in January, killing all six people aboard, remained on the ground 8 minutes longer than it should have after receiving a deicing treatment in a snowstorm, according to a preliminary report issued Friday by the National Transportation Safety Board.

The plane should have waited no more than 9 minutes from the start of when the deicing treatment began before taking off in those cold and snowy conditions, according to Federal Aviation Administration guidelines. But the NTSB report said 17 minutes passed before takeoff.

The cockpit voice recorder captured the pilot commenting that it was “standard” to have 14 to 18 minutes and that if the wait was more than 30 minutes, they would return to the ramp to have the plane retreated, and the copilot concurred, the report states. Aviation safety consultant John Cox said that comment “makes me wonder if they actually ran the time” because the guidelines make it clear they didn’t have that much time.

The report does not identify the cause of the crash, which won’t come until the final report is done sometime next year. But aviation safety expert Jeff Guzzetti, who used to investigate crashes for both the NTSB and FAA, said the preliminary report “removes some of the mystery of what happened here.”

“There is no doubt in my mind that the loss of control at liftoff — which was accompanied with an aerodynamic stall warning and sudden right bank — was likely due to snow and ice contamination on the right wing,” Guzzetti said.

He said the pilots’ comments about how long they could wait before getting a second deicing treatment raises questions about how much experience the Texas-based crew had with flying in cold weather. The NTSB will examine that as well as the procedures the airport used in the deicing process, the quality of the chemicals applied and every other factor that could have contributed to the crash.

Deicing guidelines designed to keep planes safe

The FAA guidelines on how long a plane can wait before taking off are an estimate of how long the deicing treatment will keep the wings free of ice, which is crucial to allowing it to fly. Regulations dictate that pilots should never take off with ice on their wings because countless crashes have been caused by ice buildup.

The deicing process includes treating a plane with two different chemicals. The first one is designed to remove any ice from the plane. The second chemical helps prevent ice from accumulating again. The FAA calculates the recommended holdover time from the start of the application of the second anti-icing chemical, which happened at 7:27 p.m. before this crash. The plane didn’t try to take off until 7:44 p.m.

The plane actually sat at the deicing pad for almost five minutes after it was treated while it restarted its engines. And even after it reached the runway it sat for almost four more minutes before the pilots told the tower they were ready to takeoff.

“We know this much. The airplane exceeded the holdover time chart,” said Cox, who is the CEO of Safety Operating Systems and a former airline pilot

A snowy stopover on the way to Europe

The luxury Bombardier Challenger 600 jet that was owned by a Texas law firm had stopped in Bangor to refuel en route to Paris amid light snow, mild winds and near-zero temperatures as a massive storm began to reach Bangor. Another plane had just aborted takeoff, radioing to the tower that they chose not to fly because visibility wasn’t great and they would need another application of deicing fluid.

The snow would eventually accumulate to about 9.5 inches (24 cm), but it was only beginning at the time of the crash. Investigators, who were initially hampered by the extreme weather conditions, recovered the cockpit voice and data recorders for analysis.

After it crashed, the plane landed upside down on the runway and burst into flames. The airport remained closed for several days afterward.

“There were multiple airport CCTV cameras that captured the airplane during the takeoff,” the report states. “Several of these cameras showed the airplane impact the ground followed by multiple explosions as the impact sequence progressed.”

Two previous icing crashes involving this plane model

More than two decades ago there were two other fatal crashes involving ice buildup on a Bombardier Challenger 600 like this one in Birmingham, England; and Montrose, Colorado. There have been several other incidents involving this plane model where icing contributed to an unexpected roll on takeoff in cold weather but pilots were able to recover in those cases.

The FAA published new rules afterward to make clear to pilots and airports that even a small amount of frost on the wings can be a problem. The agency also clarified the standards for deicing to make certain that all frozen particles are removed from the wings, and it required a combination of tactile and visual inspections.

Bombardier was also required to add a cold weather operations warning to the plane’s flight manual, but more than 1,000 of these Challenger 600s have been delivered, and the planemaker said they are designed to be safe.

The four passengers and two pilots had stopped to refuel in Bangor as they traveled from Houston to France on Jan. 25. The passengers included Houston lawyer Tara Arnold, 46, and three people who worked for her luxury travel company.

The other victims were event planner Shawna Collins, 53, of Houston; chef Nick Mastrascusa, 43, and sommelier Shelby Kuyawa, 34, both of Hawaii; and pilots Jacob Hosmer, 47, of Pearland, Texas, and Jorden Reidel, 33, of Texas.

The international airport in Bangor, about 235 miles (378 kilometers) north of Boston and 130 miles (210 kilometers) north of Portland, is one of the closest in the U.S. to Europe and is often used to refuel private jets flying overseas. The Bombardier was headed for the Champagne region of France when it crashed.