One of the last things air traffic controllers heard as a small plane carrying a Christian missionary father and his daughter descended rapidly over Florida last month was heavy breathing and grunting before the plane crashed.
The National Transportation Safety Board described the plane’s fatal Nov. 10 flight in its preliminary report Wednesday, but the cause of the crash won’t be known until the investigation is completed sometime next year. The founder of Christian ministry organization Ignite the Fire, Alexander Wurm, 53, and his daughter Serena Wurm, 22, were killed in the crash.
The Wurms were bringing humanitarian aid to Jamaica when the Beechcraft King Air plane they were flying crashed into a pond in a residential area of the Fort Lauderdale suburb of Coral Springs, narrowly missing homes.
The NTSB report also raised questions about whether the plane might have been overloaded, but investigators haven’t determined yet if that was the case.
The preliminary report says the missionary group planned to load 1,000 pounds of supplies onto the plane, including a generator. But when they got to the airport the pilot had already loaded about 200 pounds of gear.
The report said the pilot checked the stated weight of everything on a report as it was loaded but didn’t weigh the items. The generator was strapped down in the back while other supplies were stacked on the seats in the cabin. The pilot left behind some items for a future flight.
But the NTSB said the plane didn’t make it far from the Fort Lauderdale airport before it started to descend sharply after leveling off at 4,000 feet. The plane reached a speed of 270 knots before it crashed. Security cameras captured the last moments of the flight, showing the plane with its nose pointed 45 degrees down before it smashed into the water.
The plane broke apart on impact. The NTSB said it had recently been overhauled with new interior finishings and avionics after it was purchased by its current owner in February 2024.
In the week before the crash, the plane had made four other trips to Jamaica that was ravaged by Hurricane Melissa.
The powerful Category 5 storm made landfall in Jamaica on Oct. 28 and tied for the strongest landfalling Atlantic hurricane in history. The storm also caused devastation in Cuba, Haiti and the Dominican Republic and prompted relief organizations to mobilize.
Ignite the Fire said after the crash that the Wurm family was passionate about humanitarian work and their Christian faith. The group that Wurm founded is “dedicated to empowering youth through missions and evangelism across the Caribbean.”
By JOSH FUNK
AP Transportation Writer
