Fox News has a story with a picture of the wreckage. The aircraft doesn't appear to have had much horizontal speed at the time of impact since the debris is all in one spot and there are no obvious gouges in the terrain leading to the wreck.
Yeah, that is odd, for sure - was like it was parked there, and burned. Tail is upside down, but I can't tell if the rest of it is ... Something strange going on there ...
If that is accurate and it probably is, he probably hit an updraft and flamed out both engines.... With no chance of a relight! After that... He is pretty much a flying coffin! At that altitude, that a/c cannot light it's APU, so he was on battery power with very little of anything else!
Always better to fly around weather rather than try to top it near the ac service ceiling. I’ll take a rough ride in thicker air and add a few minutes by avoiding it where possible. Even when flying in the high 40’s I still give the big Cb’s a lot of room.
That was the incident I was referring to... I personally saw the FDR Data and heard the CVR! The crew were having a Joy Ride and paid the ultimate price for it...
Your ADS-B numbers for the climb would yield a climb rate of over 76,000 fpm which would indicate a vertical gust that would rip the wings off if encountered at any altitude, and many orders of magnitude above part 25 certification requirements. Doesn't matter, but the math doesn't work with the picture of the airplane with the burned up wings in view.
If altitude is determined by barometric pressure and not by other means, eg radar, in areas of significant atmospheric disturbances altimeter readings may be unreliable. A 5000 foot climb in 4 seconds is remarkable and could induce excessive g on the souls on board and the airframe.
The picture in my link is the point! Can't hit that flat without an unrecoverable stall with an aft CG. the Baron didn't have any fuel in it, the Challenger did, but not much. And 15 degrees right would have cleared the weather, yet he chose to try to out climb it. Challengers ain't home sick angels, ergo you turn, not climb for tall weather. Got a CL60 type in my pocket with a few hours of doin it. This aircraft is registered to a US trustee, since 2017, with an N number and spent 98% of it's time flying around central and northern MX. And probably on somebodies US 135 certificate. It smells at least and if it really had 10 pax., then it wasn't legal without a FDR. The US customs departure form lists 12 souls, crew of 3, 9 pax. Many discrepancies in the "food editor" reporting so far but at any rate I hope the DEA just lost some persons of interest. If not, RIP.
There are two things that immediately stood out to me when I saw the flight track and crash site photo — the severe weather in the immediate vicinity, and the fact that they seemed to have fallen out of the sky and pancaked. There is a big bush behind the right wing that would have been taken out if they had had any forward momentum. They seem to have gotten into a stall / flat spin and never recovered.
That happened with the #1 prototype during early flight tests at Mojave. It had a spin 'chute and it was deployed, but didn't help enough, so the crew bailed out. Unfortunately, one of them got caught in the spin 'chute and was killed.
There is certainly evidence that he had a Steep, Flat Approach to the Crash Site... It looks like he was at or close to his service ceiling (41,000). The CL60 has a very close envelope for speeds at that altitude. I know of a couple of pilots who hot dogged a CRJ-200 at 43000' flamed out both engines and died at the crash site.... I too agree that they should have turned, as the weather was not that far south of them and would not have cost them much time.
Just thinking back to an Great Old Friend, Preacher (RIP) who loved flying the CL60/200's... I am sure he could have given us some good insight.
You "hope the DEA just lost some persons of interest"???!!! Are you a cold heartless piece of shit!!!??? There were pilots and crew on that plane!!!!!!!!!! You sir DO NOT deserve to be in the air!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I see nighflyer’s comment was downvoted, but you can still click to view it, and it reads as though it’s responding to another comment that isn’t there at all. At least, that’s the only way it makes sense to me. :)
I saw the flight plan showed the pilots license "pending." Why are these people flying passengers before their ticket is issued? Reminds me of the Lear that crashed in Mexico with the pilot having a private rating.
Time for law enforcement to be sure only those qualified have access to US runways.
Probably a 61.75 foreign based US pilot certificate which is required to fly N reg aircraft internationally. There is a bit of a lag time from when the temp is issued until the permanent certificate comes with the cert number.