Investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) have arrived in Dallas to investigate Saturday's mid-air collision between two vintage planes at the Wings Over Dallas airshow.
The agency has confirmed six people were killed in the collision. Five people were on board the larger plane, identified as a Boeing B-17G and one person was on board the smaller plane, a Bell P-63F.
"On behalf of the NTSB, I want to express my deepest sympathies to the families who lost loved ones in this terrible tragedy," said NTSB Board Member Michael Graham.
The Commemorative Air Force organization has been granted authorization to release the names of all the B-17 Flying Fortress and P-63 Kingcobra flight crews involved. They include Terry Barker, Craig Hutain, Kevin "K5" Michels, Dan Ragan, Leonard "Len" Root, and Curt Rowe.
The NTSB has already started securing debris from the crash with help from the Dallas Police Department. Most of the wreckage landed on the property of Dallas Executive Airport, but some landed outside the airport's boundaries. That debris being moved to a secure location for further examination. Examiners will lay out both aircraft and look at the airframe and engines.
"Several other investigators will be examining the following areas: airworthiness, operations, air traffic control and aircraft performance," Graham said. The NTSB is also reviewing audio recordings from the air traffic control tower, photographing the wreckage site from the ground and using drones, interviewing other flight crews, and reviewing pilot training and aircraft maintenance records.
Neither of the two planes had a flight data recorder or cockpit voice recorder, commonly known as the plane's "black box". Both aircraft date back to the 1940's and those features were not required.
The absence of those two modern features means investigators will pay special attention to any pictures or video recordings of the collision.
"If anybody in the public has any photos or videos, we'd like to ask that you please share them with the NTSB," Graham said. "They'll actually be very critical...to analyze the collision and also tie that in with the air traffic control recordings...to determine how and why this accident happened and hopefully make some safety recommendations to prevent it from happening in the future."
The NTSB has set up an email account for people to submit their photos and videos at witness@ntsb.gov.
Investigators will also be looking into some of the procedures for the air show.
"One of the parts of our investigation will be to look at what the FAA calls the 'air show box', where aircraft are allowed to do their performance. There should not be any vehicles or people underneath them," said Graham. "Granted, planes do fly outside the box to set up for their maneuvers, so this is one of the areas we will be looking at very closely."
A preliminary report on the collision could take four to six weeks to report. A final, detailed report will likely take 18 months.
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