There was a troubling conversation in the final moments of a doomed jet flight into Akron Fulton International Airport in November as the pilot repeatedly corrected the co-pilot on altitude, air speed, rate of descent and flaps, according to documents released Wednesday by the National Transportation Safety Board.
Co-pilot Renato Marchese was in command of the Hawker 127-700 that crashed Nov. 10, 2015, into an Ellet neighborhood. The corporate jet carried the two crew members and seven employees of Pebb Enterprises of Boca Raton, Fla. All died.
One of the passengers, about nine minutes before the crash, joked, “You guys know where you’re goin’? You know where you’re goin’?”
Marchese already was struggling with details, and warned the passenger that they were headed for bad weather and it was going to be tense.
A year earlier, Marchese received a scathing review and was later fired by his previous employer for failure to have memorized facts necessary for flying and an inability to deal with real-time issues.
An instructor in the Boeing 737 class said Marchese was “having difficulty transitioning from the sterile environment of the simulator, to real world line flying.”
The NTSB also noted that both Marchese and Capt. Andres Chavez weren’t following custom for the plane’s owner, ExecuFlight. Captains fly when there are passengers. Co-pilots, also known as first officers, fly when there are no passengers, NTSB said.
The seven passengers were on a two-day mission from home base to inspect commercial property across the Midwest, including Cincinnati and Dayton before coming to Akron.
Marchese was navigating through thick clouds that descended to the minimum allowed for landing at an airport not equipped with a modern guidance system that draws a plane neatly to the end of the runway.
Troubling transcripts
Akron area pilots who read the transcript shared a common concern: Was Marchese inexperienced?
Phil Canfora, who’s been a pilot since 1968, said the conversation between the pilot and co-pilot left him shaken. He prefaced his thoughts by saying he had not examined any of the reports except for the transcript.
“There’s a lot there in that transcript that causes me to have serious concerns about the qualifications of the co-pilot,” said Canfora, a Norton resident. “There was a great deal going on that would not be usual in the cockpit in a usual flight, questions that he should have known the answer to and he didn’t seem to.”
He said the co-pilot’s questions covered very basic aviation knowledge, including terminology that students learn early.
“The questions that were asked make it sound like the co-pilot didn’t know the answers or even the questions,” he said.
According to the transcript, the pilot told the co-pilot twice that he shouldn’t be descending as quickly as he was.
“He was diving at 2,000 feet per minute — four times more than would be acceptable,” Canfora said.
The pilot and co-pilot also should have had a briefing before landing, but Canfora said the transcripts don’t show it.
Another pilot who declined to be identified because of his employer offered most of the same observations.
‘We gonna stall’
A little more than three minutes before impact, there was a sound of the engine power decreasing. Several seconds later, Chavez warned Marchese that he was going only 120 knots, which is about the speed the plane should have when it touches the runway.
“You can’t keep decreasing your speed,” he warned.
Marchese responded, “How do you get 120?”
Chavez said flaps weren’t yet fully extended, indicating that they would dangerously slow the plane.
“… because we gonna stall,” Chavez warned.
At this point, they checked some landing procedures, although two area pilots who read the transcript noted that there appeared to be no procedural checklist.
Two minutes had passed since the engines were throttled down. Power was reduced once again, and they agreed it was time for final descent.
They had only one more minute before it came to an explosive end.
Marchese put the plane into a steep dive.
It took about 20 seconds for Chavez to realize the rate of descent and say sharply: “You’re diving. You’re diving. Don’t dive. Two thousand feet per minute, buddy...”
Marchese may have over-corrected.
Chavez said, “Oh, don’t.”
Seven seconds later, he said, “Ground,” as they broke through the clouds.
Area pilots speculated that the plane, when it leveled, slowed too much and had insufficient power in the engines.
Ten seconds after that maneuver, the stick began to shake, indicating a stall was imminent.
While there are indications that they gave the engines more power, it takes more than five seconds for the additional thrust to affect the plane.
Five seconds later, the computer said “Pull up,” but it was too late.
At that point, Chavez began uttering expletives.
No official cause
Transcripts of the cockpit conversation from Dayton to Akron, plus more than 1,000 other pages of documents can be accessed at the NTSB website, http://go.usa.gov/cuxVP.
While there are some generalizations and findings in the documents, there is no conclusive statement as to what caused the crash.
NTSB said that more records may be added as they become available.
Company response
Danny Lewkowicz, president of ExecuFlight, the Florida company that owned the plane, said Wednesday that he had not yet seen transcripts of the conversation before the crash.
Lewkowicz stressed that he could not give an assessment of what caused the crash.
While the NTSB documents show the captain was fired by his previous employer for failing to participate in training, Lewkowicz cautioned that that was misleading.
He said Chavez had interviewed with ExecuFlight before his scheduled training with Halperin USA, and chose not to take courses at Halperin’s expense, knowing he was likely to leave.
He said co-pilot Marchese came “highly recommended” by another pilot already employed by the company.
Lewkowicz said he was aware of the critical review by Marchese’s previous employer and was not concerned.
“We questioned him about that,” he said. “But when we sent him to schooling, no additional training was asked of us.”
“We strongly believe that we were not negligent in this terrible accident. We wished that it hadn’t happened for the sake of the families and our staff,” Lewkowicz continued. “But unfortunately it did.”
“What I will say is the pilots were busy,” said Lewkowicz, who had listened to the tapes shortly after the crash and sent a technician to help the NTSB transcribe them. “They had their hands full. They were shooting an approach in some real bad weather. When people are stressed, they can make a mistake.”