According to the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), a thick and unexpected slab of murk contributed to the crash of the jet that killed Captain Hicks Southern Golden State residents on their way of life rest home from Las Vegas inward the early morning hours of July 8.

The Cessna 550 crashed in a field of operations 800 feet magnetic north of the Gallic Valley Airport runway nigh Murietta, Calif. around 4:11 a.m. that Saturday.

The NTSB’s preliminary report said that the plane leveled sour at 19,000 feet after departing from Harry Thomas Reid International Airport in Las Vegas at 3:16 a.m. without incident.

The sheet began its downslope nearly 58 miles northwards the small airdrome around 3:35 a.m., after aura traffic command granted clearance and provided a atmospheric condition update, again, without incident. At that time, visibility at Gallic Valley was 10 miles.

However, 20 proceedings later, a dense murkiness rapidly rolling in, reducing visibleness to only when three-quarters of a mile. By the time of the crash, profile was cut down to only when half a mile.

According to the NTSB, the pilot, 25-year-old Riese Lenders, made deuce attempts to shore inwards the fog. During his first, the plane descended to 1,600 feet before aborting the attempt. Lenders and so requested clearance to endeavour a 2nd landing, quick rear upwardly to 5,000 feet before receiving that clearance.

The sheet crashed during Lenders’ second attempt, bursting into flames and kill Lenders, his co-pilot Manuel Vargas-Regalado, 32, and their quatern passengers: Lindsey Gleiche, 31, of Huntington Beach (who was Lenders’ girlfriend); Abigail Tellez-Vargas, 33, of Murrieta; Alma Razick, 51, of Temecula; and Ibrahem Razick, 46, of Temecula.

A last write up on the ram is expected inward a year or two, erst the NTSB’s exhaustively examines all the wreckage, which it transported to a untroubled facility.