MIAMI – The badly mangled remains of Chalk’s Ocean Airways Flight 101 will be raised Wednesday, and investigators’ preliminary survey of the crash site did not rule out any possible cause.
The right wing of the downed plane was plucked from the ocean Tuesday afternoon – with one of the two propeller-driven engines still attached – and the bulk of the 48-foot body is scheduled for removal after sunrise on Wednesday.
“We’ve done as much as we can in the water,” said Mark Rosenker, acting chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, speaking at an afternoon news conference.
The Government Cut channel was scheduled to reopen Tuesday evening, at which point the salvage would end for the day. Three cruise ships carrying nearly 10,000 passengers will be allowed to sail, as will some cargo ships.
The channel will close again at 6 a.m. on Wednesday, when investigators will begin raising the seaplane.
The job of lifting the remains of the 58-year-old plane will fall to Atlanta AirRecovery, a contractor hired by Chalk’s. It is a delicate process because the plane’s remains could be fragile.
“It’s not the kind of thing where you can just pick it up,” Rosenker said.
A Coast Guard cutter and at least five police boats sifted through the debris field off Government Cut on Tuesday morning, collecting evidence from the wreck that killed 20 people en route from Watson Island to Bimini in the Bahamas on Monday afternoon.
Divers were photographing and mapping the 35-foot depths where the plane’s cabin came to rest, an effort to “acquire all the investigative information we need from the bottom,” said Coast Guard Capt. James Maes.
The divers were not able to retrieve the cockpit voice recorder, which is believed to be in the plane’s tail and could provide key information about the Grumman G-73T Mallard seaplane’s final flight.
“What we’ve seen is a fairly mangled aircraft, unfortunately,” Rosenker said.
The plane crashed shortly after its 2:30 p.m. takeoff on Monday, killing the two pilots and 18 passengers, including three infants. Most were from Bimini, and many routinely made the short hop between the Bahamian islands and South Florida.
Horrified beachgoers watched the plane spew smoke as it flew east, losing a wing that burst into flame as it spun into the water.
The NTSB has not ruled out any possible cause, Rosenker said, and is investigating the possibilities of structural failure, engine trouble, weather problems, air traffic and more. Until the wreck is salvaged, he said the investigation is stalled.
“We’re working really in the dark,” he said.
The agency took maintenance and flight records on all five planes from Chalk’s fleet and was planning to review the records of the two crew members, including determining what they had been doing during the 72 hours before the flight. Rosenker would not discuss the contents of those files.
At least one of Chalk’s four other planes resumed flying Tuesday, and at least some of the passengers on a morning flight from Bimini to Fort Lauderdale were coming to Florida to identify victims of the crash, according to Mickalon Bellard, manager of Chalk’s Fort Lauderdale station.
“It’s hard – they’re like family to us, but we’re trying to be strong,” said Bellard, who personally knew many of the frequent fliers on Monday’s flight. “God takes care of his own.”
Bellard also confirmed that the doomed flight originated in Fort Lauderdale before stopping at Watson Island on its way to Bimini.
The NTSB inquiry will likely take nine months or more, investigators said, and they urged witnesses to come forward with still photos or video of the crash. At least one amateur video, a 26-second clip that showed the entire disaster, was widely broadcast on television.
“It’s rare you get a chance to see an accident while it’s going on,” Rosenker said of the video.
Investigators have not released the names of the pilots or passengers.
—
(c) 2005, The Miami Herald.
Visit The Miami Herald Web edition on the World Wide Web at http://www.herald.com/
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.
—–
PHOTOS (from KRT Photo Service, 202-383-6099): PLANECRASH
AP-NY-12-20-05 2004EST
Send questions/comments to the editors.
Success. Please wait for the page to reload. If the page does not reload within 5 seconds, please refresh the page.
Enter your email and password to access comments.
Hi, to comment on stories you must . This profile is in addition to your subscription and website login.
Already have a commenting profile? .
Invalid username/password.
Please check your email to confirm and complete your registration.
Only subscribers are eligible to post comments. Please subscribe or login first for digital access. Here’s why.
Use the form below to reset your password. When you've submitted your account email, we will send an email with a reset code.