A 20-year-old pilot who had pursued her passion for aviation since childhood was among nine people killed when a private jet crashed into a residential area of Palm Beach County, Florida, on Sunday afternoon.
Nathalia Filgueiras, of Boca Raton, was serving as co-pilot aboard a Learjet 60 operated by Upper Jets, a private charter company based in Fort Lauderdale, according to her mother, Camila Corteleti.
The aircraft was travelling from Texas to the Bahamas when it plunged to the ground, leaving a smouldering crater and wreckage scattered across a residential street.
US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy confirmed on Sunday that all nine people aboard the aircraft had died. Authorities said there were no apparent injuries among people on the ground.
Flight communications recorded shortly before the crash revealed the crew’s increasingly desperate attempts to respond to an emergency.
A female pilot initially reported rain, light icing and moderate turbulence to air traffic controllers in Miami, describing the ice as “manageable”.
She subsequently requested permission to climb to 37,000 feet before declaring a mayday emergency.
As the aircraft rapidly lost altitude, she warned controllers that it was descending at approximately 20,000 feet per minute.
“We’re going to crash into the ground,” she said.
Investigators have not established which pilot was controlling the aircraft when the emergency began.
Filgueiras had obtained her pilot’s licence at 17 and accumulated more than 1,300 flying hours, according to her mother.
Corteleti recalled that her daughter had developed a love of aviation while accompanying her father, a recreational pilot, and watching aircraft take off and land at Boca Raton Airport.
“She loved the freedom,” her mother said. “It was completely different seeing the world from the top.”
Filgueiras had reportedly decided to become a pilot when she was about 12 years old.
Jared Isaacman, administrator of NASA, cautioned against drawing premature conclusions about the crash, saying investigators needed to examine several possible factors, including structural problems, maintenance history and weather conditions.
Isaacman also praised the young co-pilot for continuing to communicate with air traffic controllers during the emergency.
“She was doing her job,” he said, adding that she had continued communicating “right to the end in a terrifying situation”.
Investigators were examining the wreckage on Monday as authorities worked to establish the cause of the crash.
The identities of the remaining passengers had not been publicly disclosed in the report.