Clifford Law Offices has dealt with many cases involving aircraft that have crashed due to the stalling of one or more engines and a pilot’s failure to recover from the upset. After a press conference today held by officials of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), it was revealed that the initial cause of the plane crash that left six people dead, including two small children, Monday in Gaithersburg, Maryland, was due to just such a failure. The NTSB continues to have investigators on the scene and recovered the black box earlier today (Dec. 9, 2014) from the Embraer twin-engine jet that contained the critical cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder. Later today, officials there revealed that upon trying to land, the jet carrying three people stalled at 88 knots followed by 20 seconds of stall warning and then the aircraft pitched and rolled until it crashed. Parts of the plane crashed into a house that killed three people, a mother and her two young children, and other debris went flying into two adjacent houses on a cul-de-sac street in the suburb of Washington, D.C., setting them ablaze. Those pieces are being gathered as further evidence. Airplane systems issues and other factors such as ice accretion on the wings can often contribute to pilots failing to maintain airspeed and losing control, and the NTSB investigation of this accident should eventually generate conclusions in those areas. Clifford Law Offices has had extensive experience in handling executive jet crashes and other types of aircraft that resulted in similar tragedies. Stalling of aircraft occurred in the Colgan jet crash that was headed to Buffalo, New York, in 2009 where Clifford Law Offices represented four families. The crash of Asiana Airlines, of which the firm serves as local counsel to several families, also involved the stalling of a commercial aircraft. Attorneys at the firm are available to speak on how this can occur and how it can be prevented to avoid future tragedies like what occurred in Maryland yesterday.
To contact one of the aviation attorneys at Clifford Law Offices, please call the firm’s Communications Partner Pamela Sakowicz Menaker at 847-721-0909 (cell) or the firm at 312-899-9090. www.CliffordLaw.com