CARSON CITY, Nev. — A medical services plane apparently broke apart before it crashed in western Nevada on Friday, killing all five people on board, authorities said.
During a news conference on Sunday in Carson City, Bruce Landsberg, the National Transportation Safety Board’s vice chairman, said an outboard section of the right wing, a horizontal stabilizer and an elevator of the Care Flight broke off before the crash, KOLO-TV reported.
“How do we know if the airplane broke up in flight?” Landsberg said. “We found parts of the airplane one-half to three-quarters of a mile away” from the crash scene.
The Care Flight aircraft, a single-engine Pilatus PC-12, crashed in Stagecoach at about 9:45 p.m. PST, KOLO reported. According to a statement from REMSA Health, the pilot, a flight nurse, a paramedic, a patient and a family member of the patient were killed.
Landsberg said that a team spent all day looking for pieces of the plane, which was built in 2002, The Associated Press reported.
He added that there was no flight data recorder on the flight, and that none was required by law, KOLO reported. There was also no distress call from the pilot.
There was nothing Friday night in the weather that precluded them from flying, he said. “It was pretty much a normal evening,” Landsberg said.
Weather was not a factor, Landsberg said.
“It was pretty much a normal evening,” he said. “I think it is too soon at this point to rule anything in and anything out.”