The copilot of the doomed Learjet that hit like a missile on the side of a road just outside West Palm Beach, Florida, on Sunday was a 20-year-old woman named Nathalia Gadelha Filgueiras.
She had earned her pilot's license while just 17 and still in high school.
Her accomplishment even made local news at the time. "I definitely do brag," she told CBS12 in 2023, "because people say, 'Oh, you can't drive,' and I'm like, 'Yeah, but I can fly.'"
Her father is also a licensed pilot.
As the Learjet began its horrific descent, Filgueiras is heard on the radio to air traffic control calling in a mayday. In the background, the still-unidentified male pilot can be heard praying the "Our Father," specifically, "…who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name."
"While the man prayed," reports the Daily Mail, "Filgueiras could be heard saying that the Learjet 60 had banked 60 degrees, meaning it was flying sideways."
Seconds later, the $2 million jet, which had left Austin, Texas, and was headed to the Bahamas, hit the side of the road like a missile and exploded into a fireball. All nine people on board are dead.
Early speculation about the cause of the crash revolves around a phenomenon known as "coffin corner."
The coffin corner is a narrow speed window where, when the plane is flying high in the air, the air is so thin the plane must go a certain speed to 1) stay in the air but 2) not go so fast that the air and altitude rattle the plane, making it difficult to control. In the coffin corner, you have a very narrow range of speed, and slowing just a little can drop the plane into a free fall. Storms can make navigating this even trickier.
Per the Daily Mail, the weather was bad.
Weather conditions in the West Palm Beach area on Sunday afternoon were poor — overcast with rain and lightning in the area and winds from the east at 15 mph, gusting to near 25 mph. The National Weather Service in Miami said visibility was seven miles.
At this point, it is all speculation. The Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board will handle the investigation.
What we do know is that the Learjet plunged 30,000 feet in about 100 seconds and that the co-pilot's last words were, "We are descending 22,000 feet, and we are banking 60 degrees," followed by, "We’re out of time."
The only good news is that there are no reports of anyone on the ground being hurt.
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