 Cordoned-off crash site with burned buildings in background guarded by police officers | |
| Accident | |
|---|---|
| Date | 4 November 2008 |
| Summary | Encounter with wake turbulence due to pilot error by fraudulently certified flight crew |
| Site | Las Lomas, Mexico City, Mexico 19°25′35″N 99°12′13″W / 19.42639°N 99.20361°W |
| Total fatalities | 16[1] |
| Total injuries | 40 |
| Aircraft | |
| Aircraft type | Learjet 45 |
| Operator | Secretariat of the Interior |
| Registration | XC-VMC |
| Flight origin | Ponciano Arriaga International Airport, SLP |
| Destination | Mexico City International Airport |
| Occupants | 9 |
| Passengers | 6 |
| Crew | 3 |
| Fatalities | 9 |
| Survivors | 0[2] |
| Ground casualties | |
| Ground fatalities | 7 |
| Ground injuries | 40[3] |
On 4 November 2008 an official Mexican Secretariat of the Interior aircraft crashed in central Mexico City at around 18:45 local time. There were sixteen fatalities—all nine people on board and seven people on the ground.[4] The plane, a Learjet 45, was carrying Mexican Secretary of the Interior Juan Camilo Mouriño.[5]
The plane crashed in rush-hour traffic close to the intersection of Paseo de la Reforma and the Anillo Periférico, in the Las Lomas business district. During its approach to Mexico City International Airport, the plane followed a Boeing 767 too closely and encountered wake turbulence which caused it to invert into a nose-down position. The pilots were able to reduce the angle of descent, but due to excessive speed and insufficient altitude, were unable to regain control of the aircraft. The plane crashed into a building, exploding on impact and killing 16 people.
The Secretariat of the Interior-owned Learjet 45 (registration XC-VMC) left Ponciano Arriaga International Airport in San Luis Potosí and was 12 km (7.5 mi)[6] short of landing at Mexico City International Airport when it crashed. The crash occurred at 18:45 in the middle of rush-hour traffic of the Las Lomas business district,[7] causing an explosion whose flames "reached higher than the buildings".[8] According to Secretary of Communications and Transport Luis Téllez, there were no survivors.[9] Téllez also stated that the crash appeared to be an accident.[10]
The crash set multiple cars and a newsstand on fire and injured at least 40 people.[2] Body parts were reported to be scattered around the wreckage.[11]
All 9 people on board and a further 7 people on the ground were killed. Among the dead were Secretary of the Interior Juan Camilo Mouriño, top aide to President Felipe Calderón, and José Luis Santiago Vasconcelos, former assistant attorney general.[12][11][13]
After the crash, President Calderón addressed the nation live on national television. He spoke of Mouriño as one of his closest friends and collaborators and conveyed his condolences to the family.[14] He stated that Mouriño was a man who always fought to make Mexico a better country and he guaranteed the nation that there would be an investigation into the causes behind the plane crash. Calderón encouraged Mexican men and women to continue fighting for a better country no matter how difficult or painful any event may be.[14]
Marcelo Ebrard, Head of Government of the Federal District, also conveyed his condolences to Mouriño's family assured that Mexico City's government would issue a statement to the nation regarding the issue.[15] Ebrard later said that the Mexico City government would give financial aid to all of the injured receiving medical care, irrespective of whether they had been admitted to private or public hospitals. He also said that the local authorities had handed over all recordings taken by surveillance video cameras to the federal attorney general,[16] along with all witness accounts that local police gathered.
Several other political figures made statements regarding the crash, including various senators from the Institutional Revolutionary Party[17] and Germán Martínez, leader of the ruling National Action Party.[18] A group of senators from different political parties asked the Attorney General of Mexico to investigate the accident.[19]
The jet's black boxes were sent to the United States for analysis.[citation needed] Information gathered from 38 minutes of cabin conversations, along with video footage from a security camera on top of the Omega Office Building, provided evidence for an official statement by the Mexican government that the crash was the result of pilot error.[citation needed] The Learjet was ruled to have been flying too close to a Boeing 767-300ER operated by Mexicana and as a result suffered violent wake turbulence caused by the larger jet. The minimum allowable distance for a lighter plane following behind a heavier plane is 5 nautical miles (9.3 km); the Learjet was only 4.1 nautical miles (7.6 km) behind the Mexicana plane.[20]
Investigations into the accident discovered several issues with the Mexican government's use of private contractors as pilots of government aircraft.
Several key elements of the accident emerged during the investigation:[21]
The accident and subsequent investigation were featured in Season 14 – Episode 8 of documentary series Mayday. The episode was titled "Inner City Carnage" in the United Kingdom and Australia and "Accident or Assassination" in the United States and Canada.[21]
There has been controversy and conspiracy theories due to the nature of the crash and whether if it had any relation to the drug-trafficking world (suggesting it was crashed on purpose) and, relating it to the corruption within governmental institutions. One uses as evidence the fact that a helicopter, with registration XA-JSL[22] flew a mere 600m from the Learjet that day according to the Secretary of Communications and Transportation and Luis Téllez, without any problems whatsoever from the wake turbulence.[23]
