The National Transportation Safety Board has started its investigation into the aviation incident that killed Greg Biffle, his family and three others on Thursday morning at Statesville Regional Airport.
While a preliminary report will be released within 30 days, a full investigation will take 12 to 18 months before the publishing of a final report.
NTSB Member Michael Graham conducted a press conference on Friday afternoon where they detailed what the process will look like over the next calendar year. He was joined by Investigator-In-Charge Dan Baker.
Together, they explained that the early stages will include witness interviews and the gathering of all pertinent multimedia evidence of the incident.
The Cessna 550, owned by the former NASCAR Cup Series star, crashed at 10:15 a.m., just 10 minutes after takeoff, on the approach end of Runway 28. The crash killed Biffle, wife Cristina Grossu Biffle, daughter Emma (from first wife Nicole Lunders) and son Ryder.
Also on board was long-time NASCAR everyman Craig Wadsworth, who long worked with Biffle, and Dennis and Jack Dutton.
The crash produced an 1800’ debris field and the cockpit voice recorder is going back to Washington, DC for analysis.
"It's fairly long so it’s scattered wide and out so it’s going to take some time to document all that,” Graham said. “We were unable to get our drone launched today with the high winds but we want to get that digitally documented with the drone tomorrow so hopefully we can get a better idea of how wide and how much debris is out there.”
Graham also said the NTSB is not currently aware of who was piloting the plane on Thursday but acknowledged that three registered pilots were on board.
“At this time, we have been unable to verify who was piloting the airplane,” Graham said. “Three of the occupants did possess pilots’ licenses but we have been unable to verify (who was piloting) as of this time. That is one of the things we are working on.”
Graham also said that the plane could be piloted by two individuals or one with a waiver, and many pilots do fly the Cessna 550 solo, but the NTSB isn’t sure which was the case on Thursday.
Initial impact occurred just short of the runway before continuing down it.
“Yes, it did hit the ground before getting to the runway,” Graham said in response to a question.
Near the fence?
“Right in that vicinity is where the witness marks are,” Graham said. “We're still evaluating that.”
To that point, Graham made several asks of anyone who has videos and pictures, or even witnesses the incident, to reach out to the NTSB witness email account.
Graham has been led to believe the plane reapproached low but wants to conduct more interviews and see more videos and photographs.
“At this point, we are doing some interviews on site,” Graham said. “We're looking for additional witnesses and that's why I put that out in the briefing. But we don't have anything to share. It's much too early for that. That would go into our analysis section.”
Currently, the NTSB is not aware of any mechanical issues the plane may have experienced shortly after takeoff. Graham also said it was too early to speculate on what role the weather conditions might have played in the incident.
“The weather was visual flight rules but there were low ceilings out there and there was heavy drizzle at the time,” Graham said. “So, that is one of the three things we mainly look at -- the people operating the aircraft, we look at the aircraft itself and we look at the environment and the weather is one of the things we do and will look at.”
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