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Runway lights and an automated system that provides weather conditions
were out of operation at Montgomery-Gibbs Executive Airport before a
Cessna crashed into a San Diego neighborhood amid foggy conditions,
killing all its passengers, investigators revealed Friday.

As a result, the pilot did not have up-to-date weather information for
the airport where he was intending to land. Dense fog blanketed the area
just before the crash, according to the National Weather Service in San
Diego.

Air traffic control gave the pilot information about weather conditions
at an airport four miles away from where the pilot was trying to land, investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board announced on Friday.

Shortly after 3:30 a.m., the pilot and all the passengers aboard were
killed when the plane plummeted into a residential neighborhood, federal investigators said.

Dan Baker, Senior Air Safety Investigator with the NTSB, said it is
still too early to determine what caused the fiery crash that left a
debris field strewn across the San Diego neighborhood.

But investigators revealed Friday that an automated system that provides weather conditions to a pilot was out of operation due to a power surge
at the city-owned airport.

Dense fog blanketed the area just before the crash, according to the
National Weather Service in San Diego.

The air traffic control for the region provided the unidentified pilot
of the Cessna Citation with weather conditions for Marine Corps Air
Station Miramar, another airport about four miles away from
Montgomer-Gibbs, Baker said.

“So, the pilot and the air traffic control was relying on other sources
to gather weather information in the area in order to make a decision to continue the approach,” Baker said.

The pilot did not report or declare an emergency before the crash that
was reported around 3:40 a.m. on Thursday.

The runway also did not have a remote-controlled light that pilots can
use to assist them when landing at Montgomery-Gibbs Executive Airport, according to authorities. The jet hit high-tension power lines while approaching the airport and crashed into a home a few miles away at
around 3:40 a.m. according to officials. The aircraft was destroyed in a
fire after the crash, Baker said.

The aircraft was not equipped with a flight data recorder, also known as
a black box, which records vital data that can be used in an
investigation.

“We are trying to determine at this time if the airplane was equipped
with a cockpit voice recorder,” Baker said.

Maintenance records show that the aircraft did have a voice recorder
installed at one point, but investigators will not have a clear answer
on whether it was operating during the crash until they clear the
wreckage, which is expected to happen over the weekend.

During the day pilots are able to see painted runway markings that can
help them land safely at airports, but at night those indicators aren’t visible so pilots rely on runway lights, particularly during low
visibility conditions.

Randy Klatt, a member of the Foundation for Aviation Safety Advisory
Board, said it’s unlikely the reduced lighting played an outsized role
in the crash.”He was right off the approach course to the runway so that
was all good,” Klatt said. “It’s just he went too low. Why was he that low? That’s another question. Did he lose focus? Was it fatigue? Was
there some sort of problem with the airplane? And of course, certainly, that’s what the NTSB is going to be looking at.”

Aviation experts who spoke to The Times said it’s likely investigators
will find a combination of factors that resulted in the crash.

“It was very early, it was dark and it was very foggy so visibility was restricted,” Klatt said. “You have all those factors together.”

The crash comes amid ongoing issues at airports across the country,
including a series of radar outages at Newark Liberty International
airport that brought massive flight delays. Federal officials continue
to investigate the January collision in Washington between a commercial
jet and a miltary helicopter that killed 67 people.

Power outages have impacted airport operations elsewhere. Earlier this
year, a fire at an electric substation caused days of havoc at Heathrow airport. At the time, many major American airports reported they had
emergency backup systems that would keep operations going for at least
some amount of time. It’s unclear whether smaller airports like Montgomery-Gibbs have such extensive backup power supplies.

Authorities did not release the names of the pilot or the passengers who
died aboard the aircraft.

Investigators will gather evidence on the scene and document the
wreckage. Afterwards, they will investigate the pilot’s qualifications, training and flight history, which could have played a role in the
accident, Baker said.

A preliminary report is expected in the next 30 days and a final report
could take 1 to 2 years, Baker said.

The San Diego County Medical Examiner’s Office has not identified any of
the victims in the crash. A spokesperson for the office expects at least
two names to be released Friday.

Here’s what we know so far:

What happened

A Cessna 550 jet, which can accommodate up to 10 people, took off from Teterboro Airport in New Jersey at around 11:15 p.m. Eastern time on
Wednesday and stopped for just under an hour in Wichita, Kan., according
to the flight tracking site FlightAware. The aircraft was headed for Montgomery-Gibbs Executive Airport, a general aviation airport owned by
the city of San Diego and located less than three miles from the crash
site.

Around 3:40 a.m. Thursday, the jet made its approach to the airport. The
pilot announced on the radio that the plane was three miles away from
landing on Runway 28, according to a recording from LiveATC.net. The
pilot did not signal any problems with the aircraft and did not issue a distress call in the recordings reviewed by The Times.

The crash was reported roughly seven minutes later, according to
authorities.

Impact and poor conditions

The plane hit power lines about two miles before making impact with a
house in the residential neighborhood in the Murphy Canyon area, a
neighborhood that consists of military housing.

Jet fuel and debris spread across the neighborhood. At least eight
people on the ground suffered minor injuries and one person was taken to
the hospital, San Diego Fire-Rescue Department Assistant Chief Dan Eddy
said Wednesday.

The exact measurement of where wreckage of the plane fell was still
being determined by investigators.

“There’s plane everywhere,” Eddy said, calling the scene a “gigantic debris field.”

Eliott Simpson, a senior aviation accident investigator for the NTSB,
said the aircraft was flying in “very poor weather conditions.”

Dense fog had rolled into the area around the time the plane was
approaching the airport. Visibility was at half a mile at 3:55 a.m. and
had dropped to a quarter of a mile just after 4 a.m. in the area around
Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, which is just a few miles north of the
crash site, according to the National Weather Service.

“We had a marine layer that was deep enough that the clouds got into
some of the valleys this morning,” said Adam Roser, a meteorologist with
the National Weather Service in San Diego. “This one kind of crept in
from the ocean into the valley and led to some of those foggy
conditions.”

Casualties

The Federal Aviation Administration confirmed that six people were
aboard the jet. Officials said it was likely that nobody survived, but
have not released a total number of casualties from the crash.

At least two individuals were identified by colleagues, including Dave
Shapiro, co-founder of Sound Talent Group, a San Diego County-based
music agency, and Daniel Williams, who posted on his Instagram on
Wednesday afternoon that he was boarding the plane with Shapiro.
Williams is the former drummer of the metalcore band The Devil Wears
Prada. The band posted a tribute to Williams and Shapiro on its Facebook
page.

Sound Talent Group confirmed to The Times that three of its employees
died in the crash.

In a statement, the company said, “We are devastated by the loss of our co-founder, colleagues and friends. Our hearts go out to their families
and to everyone impacted by today’s tragedy. Thank you so much for
respecting their privacy at this time.”

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-05-23/what-we-know-about-the-san-diego-plane-crash

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