NTSB gives briefing on Amazon cargo plane crash in Miami

Uh, Mr. Chahun Shin, if you are not familiar with the. National Transportation Safety Board or. NTSB, we are an independent federal. agency that's charged by Congress with. investigating every civil aviation. accident in the United States and. significant events, accidents, and. incidents in all other modes of. transportation. We're here with a pretty large team, and.

I'll talk about the team and our process. in a second. Uh, but we're here at Miami. International Airport to investigate an. accident that occurred yesterday at 153. p.m. Eastern Daylight Time involving. Amazon Air Flight 7598, a Boeing 767-. 33 Alpha, which was operated by 21 Air LLC.

based in Miami. I want to just for a moment before I. continue on and talk about the. investigation. and extend our deepest condolences to. the families who lost loved ones in this. terrible tragedy. and to the families of those who were.

who suffered serious or minor injuries. We can only imagine all that you're. going through. Please know that our. hearts go out to all of you. and know that we are deeply. deeply committed. to our duty, our responsibilities. as an investigative agency.

to determine how this accident occurred, why it happened with one goal in mind, safety. and that's to prevent it from happening. again. We do that by issuing safety. recommendations in our final report at. the end of the investigation along with. probable cause and findings. Those. safety recommendations are aimed at. preventing the next tragedy. and then we work diligently.

to make sure those recommendations are. implemented and lives are saved. Speaking of saving lives, I want to. thank. the work of all the first responders on. scene and those who continue to be on. scene, specifically Miami airport, Miami. Dade Sheriff's Department, [clears throat]. Miami Dade Fire Rescue, and the local.

FBI. Now, the local FBI, who many of you. may have seen, is a force multiplier for. the NTSB. We have a memorandum of. agreement with them. They have been. extremely supportive over the years in. helping us collect evidence in. investigations. So, they are here. I also want to thank. the numerous. federal, state, and local officials, including the mayor, mayor Cava, who.

offered support, significant support, you know, for the NTSB. Thank you, mayor. Um, thank you, Commissioner, and. to others, Deputy Mayor, um, for offering your support. Uh, certainly we could never do what we do. at the NTSB without your help. And so, thank you for that. What we know so far is the flight was. arriving from San Juan, Puerto Rico with.

two crew members on board. This was the. third flight for the aircraft that. aircraft that uh yesterday went from. Cincinnati to uh Miami, Miami to San. Juan, and San Juan back to Miami. Overran runway 30 on landing, struck. navigational aids and equipment, then impacted a 2012. white Ford Econoline van.

That's was owned by Professional Ocean. Service Corporation, which is a contract. cleaning company for the airlines. In the van were seven persons on board. The aircraft then traveled through a. perimeter fence and impacted a Toyota. Corolla CrossL, which was traveling on Northwest 67th.

Avenue. and then continued into the grass and uh. impacted another fence line. which uh. separated an area where Tesla robo taxis. were stationed. In total, it was about uh 1,300 ft. uh past the paved surface.

Now, I want to set expectations. for providing investigative information. tonight. I'm really only going to talk. about our process, what we did today, what we're going to do tomorrow. And. there's a reason for that. We have a. very large team. We have a team of 32. people here. That includes us. We be. began arriving on scene at 6 PM last. night. That continued through the night. with many of our personnel going to Fort. Lauderdale and driving here. And then we. had personnel arriving throughout the. day. really through the last half hour.

So, our team is all uh was all in route. today. Uh I arrived this morning and. went straight to the scene. Um. we do we have begun collecting. investigative information. We do have. data and information but we are very. thorough factbased agency and we don't. release that information until we have.

verified it and are able to provide that. verified information to the public which. uh we hope to do uh with much of the. information tomorrow. Now, as I said, we. did go to the we went to the accident. command post today. uh and were on uh scene. Certainly, I. walked the the uh path from the uh. runway. uh past the the vehicles and to where.

the um aircraft uh came to rest. We had to be somewhat cautious today. because first and foremost uh is our. concern for the safety of our personnel. We are a safety agency. There's fuel. everywhere. Uh that will have to be uh. remediated. But then uh they are also. removing. fuel from the aircraft. So we have to.

allow that to occur. And as we speak, recovery operations continue. The recovery of victims is most. important. The investigation. and access to the aircraft as well as. evidence can wait while that uh goes for. that rec the recovery operations go. forward. That is most important. reuniting. uh families with their loved ones is.

most important. And so we want to. respect that process and do what we can. uh to begin our investigative. uh duties, but what allow what's most. important to go forward. tomorrow. Let me talk a little bit about. tomorrow. Wait, before I go to tomorrow, we were able to recovery the flight. data, recover the flight data recorder. and the cockpit voice recorder that is. going back to the NTSB tonight in just a.

couple of hours and we'll be at. headquarters where it can be evaluated. uh and downloaded. tomorrow. you know, so the entire team. of 32 uh personnel, our investigators. break up into specific areas to look at. areas of an investigation and collect. information. We'll have uh a group of. investigators focused on operations and. human performance. They will look at the.

history of the accident flight, look at. the flight crew experience, training, uh 21 air LLC policies and procedures, uh their relationship, the contractual. relationship with Amazon. We'll also look at FAA oversight of all. involved operators. We'll look at air traffic control. A. team will look at that. air traffic. services, radar data,

and we'll look at controller pilot. transmissions. We'll look at aircraft performance. We. have a specialist here focused on that. Uh we have a team focused on structures. So, they'll go in and begin documenting. the scene and look at the aircraft. wreckage, airframe wreckage, sorry. We. have a team looking at airplane systems. They'll look they'll examine the. components of the airplane's hydraulic, electrical, navigational,

pneumatic, and associated systems. That. includes instruments and the flight. controls. Uh we have a team focused on power. plants, that's the engines. And then we. have a meteorologist, a specialist here. uh that will begin looking at forecast. and uh weather conditions on landing. And uh we have a team that will look at. airport survival factors and emergency.

response. They will look at notices to. any notices to airmen that were issued, runway design. They'll look at fire and. rescue and they will look at. uh the lack thereof of an engineered. materials arresting system or EMAs. And for the I'm sure that you all have. been looking at that. Uh for those.

watching that are are not familiar, what. this is is crushable. uh lightweight material that's at the. end of a runway that safely stops an. aircraft. Uh so we will look at that. It's not at every airport across the. nation. FAA data we still have to confirm and. look at that is about 72 airports across. the US. Uh and then we have a team, our. transportation disaster assistance team. and they work with the families.

of and we have a very broad definition. of families. So the those that uh were. who. were tragically uh killed and then al. also those who were seriously injured or. or minor injuries. We'll be here for at least a week. Uh we. will not be determining probable calls. while we are on scene. Uh we are here to. document the scene and to collect the.

perishable evidence. Uh one thing the. public could really help us with is if. you think you have photos or videos or. information that is relevant to this. investigation, we would ask that you send those in to. witness. ntsb.gov. That's witness ntsb.gov. Please only send information that is.

relevant to this investigation. I have. been part of investigations where people. have sent fake photos. That really does. impact uh our ability as uh to get. through an uh those that information. because our team has to track down each. of those photos and that information. coming in. But the public has been very. helpful in the past by providing photos. and videos that were really helpful in. our investigation and giving us great. information.

With that, I you have anything you want. to add? With that, I will ask uh if you. have questions, please raise your hand. Uh please state your name and your. affiliation. I will call on you. Please. limit it to one question. If we have to. do multiple rounds, uh we will. We'll go. right here. Uh the question is the status the health.

status of the flight crew the pilot and. co-pilot. Uh the NTSB does not comment. on uh the status of uh health status of. individuals that we leave to the. authorities. So we would encourage you. to contact the authorities for that. information. >> Come back to that. Go ahead.

yesterday. >> Those are excellent questions. The. questions are on EMAS and uh whether. that would have uh helped prevent this. tragedy and should emass be everywhere. at every airport that will be a key part. of our investigation. Thank you for.

asking, >> Pete. describe the scene for us. It sounds. like a pretty long trail of destruction. >> Yeah, it's. I would describe it in word one word of. devastating. Utter devastation. I mean, you can see. in the on the paved surface tire marks. uh that continues through the grass.

There's debris everywhere. Uh the econol line van. is. um. torn apart. Uh it is um. you know certainly must have been. devastating. And then the. uh the vehicle itself, the SUV. Uh you can see airbags, the surrounding.

airbags. You can see components from. vehicles, both passenger vehicles and. the aircraft itself. C certainly. navigation components of navigational. aids. Um. some of debris from the airport and then. certainly fencing everywhere. Uh, it's. pretty extensive. >> Hard to see. And um I'm sure it must. have been very difficult for the. responders as well.

>> Yes. And then we'll go over here. >> Yeah. So the question is on the speed of. the aircraft on landing and why they. wouldn't have gone around again. A. couple of things. We do want to uh. interview the crew. We'll have to. interview the crew. We'll have to.

interview others. We're going to want to. talk uh to uh crew members of flights. that may have uh landed prior to this. flight. Uh and then um what was your. first question? Oh, their speed. We do have uh. information on speed. U we do have data, but it's from various sources and we. want to confirm that data with a flight. data recorder. So, we're going to hold.

on that for now. Uh but I hope that we. can provide that tomorrow. Yes. >> Have you been able to speak? Have we been able to speak with the. pilot, co-pilot, or survivor uh. survivors of the crash? At this time, our transportation disaster assistance. team is out and about. I have not. connected with them to see who they've. communicated with. We have not conducted. interviews yet, but those are being.

scheduled. here and then here. question is on uh pilot experience. Again, you know, we we have some. information but we need to be very. accurate on the information that we can. provide and we hope to have that. tomorrow. >> We'll get back to you tomorrow on that.

>> Yes. any indication that the pilots weren't. able to receive or didn't receive or. weren't able to receive some information. like weather information or. >> uh that will be something that we look. at. We look that at that as part of any. investigation, but we don't have.

evidence to that yet. runway. too. >> Well, zoomed out. I mean, first let me. let me say that we have an incredibly.

safe aviation system here in the United. States. With that said, when a tragedy. occurs, it's very it's devastating. So, saying we have an incredibly safe. aviation system to somebody who just. lost a loved one is. um not something that they want to hear. because they are suffering. Uh with that. said, that's why we're here to prevent. the next tragedy. I will say this. though, we have investigated. many runway excursions and I looked at.

the numbers. Uh I think it was over. 3,000 uh investigations since 2008. And. um. we can only work to prevent the next one. if our recommendations. at the end of an investigation are. implemented. If we are in the business. of repeatedly investigating an accident. or tragedy and our recommendations are.

not implemented, then we're here again. and again and again. Our whole goal as a. safety agency is one thing. It's safety. It's to save lives. And that means our. recommendations must be implemented or. we're going to be here again. I I I I. won't say that they're the question is. are they happening too often?

>> One is too often for the NTSB. just one. So uh you know here we have. people who died and other ones we have. not had fatalities but just one is a. tragedy. We'll go here. Go here. Two of the. runways are still here. >> Uh the question is when will the two. runways are uh operational, two are.

closed. Uh what will the process look. like for uh getting those operational. again and removing the aircraft? Uh. first of all, we need to document the. scene uh and we need to get access to. the aircraft itself. We do not have that. yet. Again, recovery operations are. continuing. It is not a completely safe. scene for our team as well. We have to. ensure that before we even begin our.

investigative work on the aircraft side. Certainly, we can we are already. documenting. tire marks, other uh um investigative. marks along the path of the flight. Uh. but it's going to take time. Uh we hope. uh that we can move through it swiftly. because we know it is impacting uh. flight operations here, but we have to. make sure that we're able to get access.

to the aircraft first. here and then here. >> Uh any concern about the age or. ownership of the plane? That is. something we always look into. I believe. it was manufactured in 1994. Uh we'll. always we always look at that as part of. any investigation. Yes.

Yeah. So I have looked at our the. question is what what uh recom are there. any recommendation in the past or that. might be applicable here or have we. looked at potential recommendations now. it's too early. Uh right now we're in.

the factf finding phase of the. investigation. And then we move into. analysis once we have all the facts uh. complete. Uh certainly we've looked at uh we have. a a a list of what those past. recommendations are and the status of. those recommendations, but it's too. early to say whether they were a factor. here. >> Yes.

Uh the question is uh were the victims. limited to those two vehicles? Yes, it. was the Econoline van uh transporting uh. the workers the with the cleaning. company and uh the passenger vehicle, the Toyota Corolla Cross. van was on the inside of the airport.

The uh small SUV was on the outside. >> Yeah. >> What is that? What does it mean as part. of uh the investigation when we're. looking at the relationship or. contractual relationship between Amazon. and uh 21 air? So this is an Amazon.

operation how or. operation for transporting cargo but. it's actually contracted to 21 air. So, we're going to want to see what that. relationship is, who does what, what. safety you provisions might be in any. sort of contracts or any sort of. policies, and then we'll see from there. We might even have additional. information that we seek. Thank you very. much.

>> Uh, and just please uh keep an eye on. our X feed for the next uh press. briefing which will be tomorrow. Thank. you very much.

Hey, James.