WEST PALM BEACH - A business jet crashed in South Florida on Sunday, killing all nine people on board, and a federal investigator said Monday that parts of the aircraft appeared to have broken off before it crashed, according to a report by David Fischer and The Associated Press published by The Hill.
ABC News reported that the aircraft, identified in its headline as a Learjet, crashed into a Florida roadway and that the NTSB said it may have been breaking up before it made impact with the ground.
The two accounts differ in attribution and wording. ABC News credits the NTSB with the statement that the jet "may have been breaking up," while The Hill's report, based on AP reporting, says a federal investigator, who is not named in the report summary, said parts "appear to have broken off." Both describe the aircraft coming apart before impact, but the summaries do not show whether the NTSB and the unnamed investigator are the same official.
According to The Hill's AP report, video recorded by passersby captured the crash on Sunday afternoon, when the aircraft erupted into a ball of flames.
A separate headline on The Hill's coverage reported that a woman had identified her daughter, 20, as one of the pilots on the jet. The summary of that report does not give further details about the identification, the woman's name, or the pilot's role.
The reports reviewed do not identify the cause of the crash and do not say what the investigation has found beyond the statements described above.
Sources: ABC News: Learjet may have been breaking up before it crashed in Florida, NTSB says; The Hill: Woman identifies daughter, 20, as one of the pilots on jet that crashed in Florida.