PHILADELPHIA—The cockpit voice recorder was not working on a medical transport plane that killed seven people when it plummeted into a Philadelphia neighborhood in January and likely had not been functioning for several years, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said in a preliminary report Thursday. The NTSB also confirmed the crew made no distress calls to air traffic control. A ground warning system that may contain flight data memory is still being evaluated by the manufacturer, the agency said.
The plane plummeted into a residential and commercial area within a minute of taking off from Northeast Philadelphia Airport and erupted into a fireball on Jan. 31. Officials said the crash killed all six people aboard the Learjet 55 and a seventh person who was in a vehicle on the ground. At least two dozen others were injured, including a 10-year-old boy in a vehicle who was hit by debris while trying to protect his sister.
