The cockpit voice recorder from the Learjet that plunged into a Florida mobile home park has been recovered from the wreckage, officials announced.
The National Transportation Safety Board revealed in an X post that the device was found at the crash site in Greenacres, just outside Palm Beach, and has been transported to the NTSB Vehicle Recorders Laboratory in Washington, DC for evaluation. Excavation work at the site is now complete.
The recorder, part of the aircraft’s “black box” system, captures cockpit conversations, radio transmissions and audio alerts. Smaller commercial, corporate and private aircraft are required to carry such devices, according to the NTSB.
Investigators hope any recovered audio will reveal the decisions made by the crew during the final moments before the Nov. 1 crash. The $2 million private jet was on a high-speed, nose-dive descent when it slammed into the ground, killing all nine people aboard and injuring one person on the ground.
The flight had departed Austin, Texas, bound for the Bahamas.
Among the dead were multimillionaire tech executive Adam Robinson, 44, his wife Helen Sharp, their two children, and their nanny Anita Ramirez Cetina, 24.
Pilot in command Jeff Gregory, 55, and co-pilot Nathalia Filgueiras, 20, were also killed when the aircraft went down.
The crash was captured on camera, showing the jet’s terrifying final plunge into the residential area. The NTSB has not yet indicated what caused the aircraft to plummet approximately 30,000 feet.
The recovery of the voice recorder marks a critical step in the investigation, as officials work to determine what led to one of the most shocking aviation disasters in recent Florida history.
The NTSB laboratory will now work to extract and analyze any audio preserved on the device.