Debris from a vanished medical transport plane has been found floating in the ocean off the Massachusetts coast.
The discovery was confirmed by the US Coast Guard late Saturday, hours after the Boston-bound aircraft carrying six people disappeared from radar during its approach to Logan International Airport. Crews aboard the Boston-based cutter William Sparling rushed to the debris field and began sifting through wreckage to identify parts of the downed Gulfstream G100 twinjet, a USCG spokesperson said Saturday night.
The flight had departed Bermuda’s L.F. Wade International Airport and was scheduled to land at 1:25 a.m. When it suddenly went dark on Federal Aviation Administration radar, according to the Coast Guard and flight tracking data from FlightAware.
Six people were aboard the doomed aircraft when it vanished in the waters off Nantucket early Saturday. The Coast Guard spokesperson confirmed that a full-scale investigation will likely be spearheaded by either the National Transportation Safety Board or its Canadian counterpart, the Transportation Safety Board of Canada.
Coast Guard Base Boston was expected to hold a press conference Sunday morning to provide updates on the ongoing search and rescue efforts.
The medical transport flight’s final moments remain under investigation as recovery crews continue working through the night to locate and identify wreckage from the twinjet. The aircraft type, the Gulfstream G100, is a mid-size business jet often configured for specialized missions including medical evacuation and transport services.
The Coast Guard has not yet released the identities of those aboard the missing plane or the medical transport company operating the flight. The search operation covers waters southeast of Nantucket, where the debris was first spotted by responding crews.
Coast Guard officials planned to brief reporters Sunday morning on the status of recovery efforts and any developments in the investigation.