The National Transportation Safety Board released a preliminary report Wednesday morning about a fatal plane crash that happened in Bowie in early June.
While the report provides new details about the plane’s flight path and descent, it leaves unanswered questions about the cause of the crash and the flight school that owned the aircraft.
“The preliminary report documents the factual information gathered to date and does not identify a cause or contain any analysis,” agency spokesperson Peter Knudson wrote in an email. “Determinations regarding the probable cause of the accident, along with any contributing factors, will be published at the conclusion of the investigation, which is expected to last 12-24 months.”
According to surveillance broadcast data, the small Piper Cherokee, owned and operated by the Maryland-based Washington International Flight Academy, left the Montgomery County Airpark in Gaithersburg around 4:30 p.m. on June 20 and landed at the Ocean City Municipal Airport in New Jersey at 5:41 p.m. Three passengers — 26-year-old Yoav Bomrind, 19-year-old David Rabinovich and 20-year-old Elad Neidik — were aboard.
The plane departed Ocean City at 9:28 p.m. to make three touch-and-go landings, the report said. Touch-and-go landings are a training maneuver in which a pilot lands on a runway and immediately takes off without coming to a full stop. About 16 minutes later, at 9:44 p.m., the plane landed at the Ocean City airport for a brief stop.
At 10:10 p.m., the aircraft took off for its return to Gaithersburg. The plane climbed to a cruise altitude of about 8,500 feet before proceeding west-southwest, the report said.
The plane began to descend roughly 40 miles into the flight, falling to 2,326 feet, where it lingered before tumbling farther down. Bomrind, the pilot, shifting the plane left and right during the descent, tried to transmit a radio call to controllers letting them know the plane was near Fort Meade.
The call was “partially unintelligible,” the report said.
Bomrind then put in a 7700 transponder code, indicating an in-flight emergency. Air traffic controllers responded, asking if he needed assistance.
It’s unclear what exactly he said or whether he asked for assistance, but according to the report, he said he wanted to continue to Freeway Airport in Bowie.
The traffic controllers then gave instructions to the airport and asked Bomrind if he could see it. He said he could not.
That was the plane’s last transmission before controllers lost contact with it, the report said.
At 11:28 p.m., the plane plunged into a small wooded area in Bowie, just feet from a playground and a townhome complex. As the aircraft moved through the woods, both wings were torn off the plane and tree branches were ripped apart. The engine was damaged but remained attached to the plane.
The cockpit was crushed. All three men on board were killed.
Local authorities learned of the crash through an iPhone alert. Dozens of first responders spent hours searching for the wreckage. The crash site was initially discovered by members of the aviation community, who alerted police.
Neighbors in the townhome community described hearing a boom in the middle of the night. Some said they thought it was a thunderstorm rolling in, a car blowing a tire, or a crash on Route 50. There was no explosion or fire, only the sound of the impact.
The National Transportation Safety Board continues to investigate the crash.
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