2008 Mexico City Learjet crash
Cordoned-off crash site with burned buildings in background guarded by police officers
Accident
Date4 November 2008 (2008-11-04)
SummaryEncounter with wake turbulence due to pilot error by fraudulently certified flight crew
SiteLas Lomas, Mexico City, Mexico
19°25′35″N 99°12′13″W / 19.42639°N 99.20361°W / 19.42639; -99.20361
Total fatalities16[1]
Total injuries40
Aircraft
Aircraft typeLearjet 45
OperatorSecretariat of the Interior
RegistrationXC-VMC
Flight originPonciano Arriaga International Airport, SLP
DestinationMexico City International Airport
Occupants9
Passengers6
Crew3
Fatalities9
Survivors0[2]
Ground casualties
Ground fatalities7
Ground injuries40[3]

On 4 November 2008 an official Mexican Secretariat of the Interior aircraft crashed in central Mexico City at around 18:45 local time. There were sixteen fatalities—all nine people on board and seven people on the ground.[4] The plane, a Learjet 45, was carrying Mexican Secretary of the Interior Juan Camilo Mouriño.[5]

The plane crashed in rush-hour traffic close to the intersection of Paseo de la Reforma and the Anillo Periférico, in the Las Lomas business district. During its approach to Mexico City International Airport, the plane followed a Boeing 767 too closely and encountered wake turbulence which caused it to invert into a nose-down position. The pilots were able to reduce the angle of descent, but due to excessive speed and insufficient altitude, were unable to regain control of the aircraft. The plane crashed into a building, exploding on impact and killing 16 people.

Details

Learjet 45 flying, landing gear is out
A Learjet 45, similar to the one involved in the accident

The Secretariat of the Interior-owned Learjet 45 (registration XC-VMC) left Ponciano Arriaga International Airport in San Luis Potosí and was 12 km (7.5 mi)[6] short of landing at Mexico City International Airport when it crashed. The crash occurred at 18:45 in the middle of rush-hour traffic of the Las Lomas business district,[7] causing an explosion whose flames "reached higher than the buildings".[8] According to Secretary of Communications and Transport Luis Téllez, there were no survivors.[9] Téllez also stated that the crash appeared to be an accident.[10]

The crash set multiple cars and a newsstand on fire and injured at least 40 people.[2] Body parts were reported to be scattered around the wreckage.[11]

Deaths

All 9 people on board and a further 7 people on the ground were killed. Among the dead were Secretary of the Interior Juan Camilo Mouriño, top aide to President Felipe Calderón, and José Luis Santiago Vasconcelos, former assistant attorney general.[12][11][13]

Government response

Police guarding the crash site

After the crash, President Calderón addressed the nation live on national television. He spoke of Mouriño as one of his closest friends and collaborators and conveyed his condolences to the family.[14] He stated that Mouriño was a man who always fought to make Mexico a better country and he guaranteed the nation that there would be an investigation into the causes behind the plane crash. Calderón encouraged Mexican men and women to continue fighting for a better country no matter how difficult or painful any event may be.[14]

Marcelo Ebrard, Head of Government of the Federal District, also conveyed his condolences to Mouriño's family assured that Mexico City's government would issue a statement to the nation regarding the issue.[15] Ebrard later said that the Mexico City government would give financial aid to all of the injured receiving medical care, irrespective of whether they had been admitted to private or public hospitals. He also said that the local authorities had handed over all recordings taken by surveillance video cameras to the federal attorney general,[16] along with all witness accounts that local police gathered.

Several other political figures made statements regarding the crash, including various senators from the Institutional Revolutionary Party[17] and Germán Martínez, leader of the ruling National Action Party.[18] A group of senators from different political parties asked the Attorney General of Mexico to investigate the accident.[19]

Results of investigation

The jet's black boxes were sent to the United States for analysis. Information gathered from 38 minutes of cabin conversations, along with video footage from a security camera on top of the Omega Office Building, provided evidence for an official statement by the Mexican government that the crash was the result of pilot error. The Learjet was ruled to have been flying too close to a Boeing 767-300ER operated by Mexicana and as a result suffered violent wake turbulence caused by the larger jet. The minimum allowable distance for a lighter plane following behind a heavier plane is 5 nautical miles (9.3 km); the Learjet was only 4.1 nautical miles (7.6 km) behind the Mexicana plane.[20]

Corner of glass office building with several windows boarded up
Repair two weeks after the crash

Investigations into the accident discovered several issues with the Mexican government's use of private contractors as pilots of government aircraft.

Several key elements of the accident emerged during the investigation:[21]

  • Pilot Martín Olíva and co-pilot Álvaro Sánchez[13] were not certified to operate the Learjet 45. The investigation concluded that both pilots had received fraudulent certifications: Captain Olíva lied about the number of training flights he had made, and had issues on the few training flights he did complete, while Captain Sánchez lied about being a Learjet 45 instructor. Both men had taken advantage of a corrupt system to get false training documents and some unsigned Learjet 45 certification forms from their flight schools. These revelations led Mexican authorities to suspend the licences of both flight schools.
  • The descent profile showed that the improperly trained pilots approached the airport with an inconsistent descent angle. The plane descended rapidly and then leveled off in a stepped approach to the airport. The plane did not slow down to the required speed dictated by the air traffic controller, which brought the plane closer to the Mexicana 767-300.
  • Conversation among the flight crew further indicates that they had little familiarity with the operation of the plane; they voiced confusion on several occasions about the cockpit instruments and failed to enter the proper information into the flight computers, did not follow a proper flight plan, and had navigational difficulties, missing their original arrival to San Luis Potosí by over 250 nautical miles (460 km). Further, their in-flight conversations were more of the nature of people driving a car, not of trained pilots following a proper flight plan.
  • The flight crew waited over a minute to follow the order from air traffic control to reduce their speed. The Learjet had been traveling at 262 knots (485 km/h), while the Mexicana 767-300 was flying at 185 knots (343 km/h); this caused the Learjet to get too close to the 767-300.
  • The accident happened during peak hours at the airport with heavy air traffic, which called into question the handling and scheduling of flight plans for top government officials.
  • The accident happened just at the point where aircraft entering Mexico City traveling on a 170° course (south-southeast) make a sharp left turn to align with the runways of Benito Juárez International Airport at 53° (northeast). When the Learjet reached the turning point, too close behind the Mexicana 767-300, and making a steep descent that dropped it through the violent wake turbulence, it caused the plane to invert into a nose-down attitude. At this point, the plane was within 1,700 feet (520 m) of the ground, limiting the room to enact a recovery.
  • The weather at the time of the accident was calm, which sustained the wake turbulence.
  • Due to the flight crew being unqualified for the plane, when faced with the conditions regarding the airspeed, inverted nose-down position, and insufficient altitude, they were unable to regain control of the plane. Though it was too late to make any difference, and too marginal to be meaningful, the flight crew did manage to reduce the angle of descent from 45° to 40° before hitting the ground at over 300 miles per hour (480 km/h).

Dramatization

The accident and subsequent investigation were featured in Season 14 – Episode 8 of documentary series Mayday. The episode was titled "Inner City Carnage" in the United Kingdom and Australia and "Accident or Assassination" in the United States and Canada.[21]

There has been controversy and conspiracy theories due to the nature of the crash and whether if it had any relation to the drug-trafficking world (suggesting it was crashed on purpose) and, relating it to the corruption within governmental institutions. One uses as evidence the fact that a helicopter, with registration XA-JSL[22] flew a mere 600m from the Learjet that day according to the Secretary of Communications and Transportation and Luis Téllez, without any problems whatsoever from the wake turbulence.[23]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "16 Dead in Mexico Plane Crash". Mexico City: Latin American Herald Tribune. Archived from the original on 18 February 2012. Retrieved 15 December 2008.
  2. 1 2 "3 dead, 5 injured in Mexico City plane crash". Xinhua News Agency. 5 November 2008. Archived from the original on 9 December 2008. Retrieved 5 November 2008.
  3. ↑ "Reporta GDF ocho muertos y 40 heridos de gravedad" (in Spanish). El Universal. 11 April 2008. Archived from the original on 3 November 2013. Retrieved 11 May 2008.
  4. ↑ Lagunas, Icela; Martinez, Edith (6 November 2008). "Suman ya 14 muertos" (in Spanish). Mexico City: El Universal. Archived from the original on 25 November 2008. Retrieved 6 November 2008.
  5. ↑ news.bbc.co.uk, BBC Profile: Juan Camilo Mourino Archived 4 November 2013 at the Wayback Machine
  6. ↑ "Mike Charly, ¿escucha?... la respuesta jamás llegó". El Universal. 6 November 2008. Archived from the original on 12 December 2008. Retrieved 6 November 2008.
  7. ↑ "Mexican minister dies in crash". Sunday Times. 5 November 2008. Retrieved 5 November 2008.
  8. ↑ "Mexico minister 'killed' in crash". BBC News. 5 November 2008. Archived from the original on 6 November 2008. Retrieved 5 November 2008.
  9. ↑ "Mexico interior minister aboard plane that crashed". Associated Press. 5 November 2008. Retrieved 5 November 2008.
  10. ↑ "No Indications that Suggest a Hypothesis Other than that It was an Accident: SCT". Office of the President of Mexico. 5 November 2008. Archived from the original on 22 June 2009. Retrieved 5 November 2008.
  11. 1 2 "Mexico's Interior Minister Killed in Plane Crash". Bloomberg Television. 5 November 2008. Retrieved 5 November 2008.
  12. ↑ "Mexico interior minister killed in plane crash: official". ABC News. 5 November 2008. Archived from the original on 6 December 2008. Retrieved 5 November 2008.
  13. 1 2 "Los tripulantes de la aeronave" (in Spanish). Mexico City: El Universal. 4 November 2008. Archived from the original on 1 December 2008. Retrieved 5 November 2008.
  14. 1 2 Jiménez, Sergio Javier (4 November 2008). "Ofrece Calderón condolencias a la familia de Mouriño" (in Spanish). Mexico City: El Universal. Archived from the original on 8 December 2008. Retrieved 4 November 2008.
  15. ↑ de la Luz González, María (4 November 2008). "Expresa Ebrard condolencias a familia de Mouriño" (in Spanish). Mexico City: El Universal. Archived from the original on 8 December 2008. Retrieved 4 November 2008.
  16. ↑ Cuenca, Alberto (5 November 2008). "Cubrirá GDF gastos médicos de heridos" (in Spanish). Mexico City: El Universal. Archived from the original on 3 October 2012. Retrieved 5 November 2008.
  17. ↑ Gómez, Ricardo; Ramos, Jorge (4 November 2008). "Manifiestan senadores priistas condolencias por muerte de Mouriño" (in Spanish). Mexico City: El Universal. Archived from the original on 3 October 2012. Retrieved 4 November 2008.
  18. ↑ Jiménez, Horacio (4 November 2008). "Lamenta Germán Martínez la pérdida de Juan Camilo Mouriño" (in Spanish). Mexico City: El Universal. Archived from the original on 9 December 2008. Retrieved 4 November 2008.
  19. ↑ Gómez, Ricardo; Ramos, Jorge (4 November 2008). "Piden senadores investigar a fondo muerte de Mouriño" (in Spanish). Mexico City: El Universal. Archived from the original on 8 December 2008. Retrieved 4 November 2008.
  20. ↑ AIN staff (November 5, 2009). "Turbulence Caused Mexican Learjet 45 Crash". AIN Online (Aviation International News). Archived from the original on 29 October 2013.
  21. 1 2 "Accident or Assassination". Mayday. Season 14. Episode 8. Cineflix. 17 February 2015. Discovery Channel Canada.
  22. ↑ "XA-JSL/XAJSL aviation photos on JetPhotos". JetPhotos. Archived from the original on 1 November 2021. Retrieved 1 November 2021.
  23. ↑ "AVIONAZO: Más dudas que certezas". www.noroeste.com.mx (in Mexican Spanish). Retrieved 1 November 2021.
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