Plane wreckage sits near the bank of the Tanana River after a fatal plane crash killed the pilot and co-pilot Tuesday morning near Fairbanks, Alaska.
Katz contextualized some of the altitude data from the website Flight Aware. The data shows the aircraft gained about 1,000 feet in a two-minute period, from a 700-foot elevation to a 1,700-foot elevation. But NTSB Alaska Region Chief Clint Johnson said there’s no indication the total weight overloaded the plane or put it out of balance.
The names of the deceased have not yet been released. In a Wednesday dispatch, Troopers said recovery efforts have continued, and the remains will be sent to the State Medical Examiner’s Office for positive identification.An ash-black hue smothered the hillside adjacent to the Tanana River Wednesday in an on-scene visit. A fuel-like smell still hovered in the air, and wreckage spilt up the bank along a steep slope and into the woods.
“Our understanding is most of was consumed by fire. Our field observations are aligning with that,” she said. “But that’s just a rough assessment.” Fire had consumed the organic layer of the ground affected by the crash, according to Maher. The officials used a photo-ionization detector, a tool meant for quantifying gas levels, to analyze the forest floor.DEC looks for measurements that return more than 20ppm of the fuels in question. Maher said one of the roughly half dozen samples exceeded that threshold, with the others coming up beneath it.