Nathalia Filgueiras was onboard private plane bound for Bahamas that crashed in Palm Beach county
Family members on Monday identified a young Florida pilot as one of nine victims of a plane crash in Palm Beach county that occurred during a heavy thunderstorm.
Nathalia Filgueiras, 20, was co-pilot of the private Learjet 60 that was en route from Austin-Bergstrom international airport in Texas to North Eleuthera airport in the Bahamas on Sunday when it suddenly plummeted out of the sky, her mother told the New York Times.
It crashed at 12.51pm local time, exploding on impact, leaving a giant crater in the ground, and scattering debris all around the crash site near a mobile home park in the city of Greenacres.
At a briefing on Monday, Tom Chapman, head of a team of about 20 National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) personnel in West Palm Beach, said conditions in south Florida on Sunday were “pretty crazy”, and that the weather would be “a major focus” of the investigation.
0:36Burning crater seen on ground after Florida plane crash – video“You all saw what the weather was like here at the surface. What we have to determine is what the weather conditions were like at altitude,” he said.
Filgueiras’s mother, Camila Corteleti, told the Times that her daughter worked for Upper Jets, a private charter firm based in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, which owned the aircraft, and that she had been passionate about flying since childhood.
“She loved the freedom. It was completely different seeing the world from the top,” Cortelini said, adding that her daughter enjoyed plane spotting at local airports as a young girl.
Filgueiras graduated high school in Boca Raton, Florida, in 2024, having already obtained her private pilot’s license at the age of 17, according to the Palm Beach CBS affiliate 12 News.
It is not yet known who the pilot in charge of the aircraft was. Aurora Aviation, which operated the aircraft under its trading name of Upper Jets, did not respond to a request for comment.
None of the other victims from the crash had been identified by late morning Monday. Neither the NTSB, nor Palm Beach county officials speaking at the press conference, gave any further details of who was aboard.
Chapman said the nine who were killed comprised two flight crew members and seven passengers. “I want to express our profound, profound condolences to the family and friends of those who were lost in this tragedy. We are truly, truly sorry for your loss,” he said.
Air traffic control (ATC) audio from the final moments of the flight feature a female voice reporting a buildup of ice on the jet’s wings, and a request for permission to climb to 37,000ft.
“The crew transmitted to ATC that they were encountering light, clear ice, which was manageable, and also moderate turbulence,” Chapman said, noting the plane was at 35,000ft at that point.
“The crew reported the outside temperature was -47C (-53F) and they were managing the ice, but were in moderate turbulence. Very soon after, the crew transmitted: ‘We are picking up precipitation, requesting to climb to 37,000ft if able,’ which was approved by FAA Air Traffic Control.
Chapman added: “Less than 30 seconds later, a transmission from the airplane announced a descent, followed by a mayday call. About 12.48pm, the airplane transmitted: “We are in an overspeed condition, descending,’ with the rest unintelligible. Sadly, all aboard were lost.”
The female crew member on the recording said the plane, tail number N722BD, was descending at more than 20,000ft a minute, and: “We’re going to crash into the ground.”
The recording ends with the woman shouting, “Holy fuck, we’re out of time,” and air traffic controllers trying to re-establish contact.
Multiple videos circulating on social media capture the Learjet striking the ground almost vertically, and at a high rate of speed.
Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor, said on Sunday it was “a cataclysmic plane crash … that looked like a missile going down.” He said it was not believed anybody on the ground was killed or injured, although NTSB staff at the Monday press conference said they believed a car occupant nearby received a minor leg wound.
The crash occurred during an outbreak of severe weather and thunderstorms in south Florida that briefly closed Miami international airport and forced commercial airliners to divert to other airports.
Bob Clifford, a veteran aviation expert and attorney, said the actions of the pilots and air traffic control would be particularly scrutinized.
“Fundamentally, these people flew into a thunderstorm, and into the red zone, and tried to navigate that, and it just doesn’t work,” he said.
“These are great planes, I’ve flown many times in a Lear 60, and they’re like rocket ships. There’s is just not a lot of margin of error up there. There’s going to be a lot of finger pointing here about why the pilots did what they did, why ATC [air traffic control] allowed them to do it, and who knew what and when.
“It seems to me that ATC maybe should have been more proactive about where they were allowing this aircraft to fly, and I think that’s something that’s going to be looked at by the NTSB.”
Chapman said the recovering debris from the crash site was going to be “a real challenge” and “daunting” given the velocity of the impact, and that while on-site investigations would continue for several days, no immediate cause of the tragedy was likely to be imminently announced.
“We do have some indication that the aircraft was breaking up before impact, and so some of this is yet to be determined,” he said. We may find parts of the aircraft some distance away from the actual impact site.”
Bombardier, which owns the Learjet brand, told the Miami Herald in statement: “We cannot comment on the potential cause of this accident until the investigation is complete, and we will fully support the investigating authorities and cooperate as needed.”
The Catholic diocese of Palm Beach dedicated an All Souls’ Day Mass on Monday to the nine people who died, the Palm Beach Post reported.