First, my thoughts and prayers go out to the families and friends of the Laredo airplane crash victim. May his memory be a blessing as loved ones remember the legacy left behind.
On June 16, 2026, a Cessna Citation Latitude business jet came to rest on a highway in Laredo, Texas. The aircraft, operated by NetJets, was en route from Los Cabos, Mexico, to Austin, Texas. Sadly the CEO of Austin’s Capital Factory, Joshua Baer, and his canine companion were fatally injured.
The NTSB recently released a preliminary report on the accident. There is mention of several mechanical nonconformances found during the preliminary investigation. The report notes damage found on the propulsion and electrical power systems.
Fuel and Electrical Issues
For the fuel system, “the right engine fuel pressure switch was found separated from the fuel tube assembly … the fuel tube assembly was fractured adjacent to the weld joint for the attachment tube leading to the fuel pressure switch,” and “multiple P-clamps on the fuel tube assembly were also found fractured.”
For the electrical power system, “the starter generator was missing multiple screws from the outer housing” and “the starter generator shaft was found bent.”
The NTSB also pointed out that the starter generator was barely three years old and just shy of 60 hours from its next 1,200-hour maintenance overhaul.
While one may be tempted to blame the incident on maintenance or manufacturing, the fact remains that the investigation is still underway. Until the final report is released, no speculation on definitive root cause should made. Furthermore, without a complete impact analysis, one cannot say whether the hardware issues mentioned in the NTSB’s preliminary report were due to the accident itself, or vice versa.
Nevertheless, regardless of what ultimately caused the aircraft to fail, there are initial findings from the Laredo crash that can be applied to pilots worldwide to enhance the safety of future flights.
Dealing with Novel Scenarios
The Cessna Citation Latitude pilots noticed an “unusual vibration” early in the flight. This “low frequency vibration” was accompanied by a “humming noise.” The crew noted that they had not experienced this before. It did not appear as if this was a common occurrence with memorized checklists.
Since the crew did not immediately know what to do to diagnose and fix the vibration, they called their flight operations (colloquially known as flight ops) duty manager on the telephone for advice.
To use a game show analogy, they “phoned a friend.”
The crew explained the situation to flight ops. During the call, the noise went away, and an aircraft alert annunciated. The fault was “BOTH ON ADC 1,” which indicates that both primary flight displays are sourcing air data parameters (e.g., altitude, airspeed, etc.) from Air Data Computer (ADC) #1 instead of their respective computers.
It is crucial to understand that flight ops support is not actively flying the aircraft or experiencing cockpit sensations. Support personnel quite literally know only what pilots communicate to them. Crew specifically told flight ops that the vibration sounded like “a fan is on.” Armed only with the information provided, flight ops mirrored what was told to them and suggested that the vibration may be coming from the avionics cooling fan.
To Declare or Not Declare (an Emergency)
Presumably convinced the vibration was benign, no emergency procedures were executed. Rather, a Quick Reference Handbook procedure was performed to clear the ADC message. While the full discussion between crew and flight ops is not yet available, the preliminary report notes that the outcome of the conversation was such that “the flight could safely proceed to its planned destination,” and that crew could later “write-up the vibration” after landing.
Nothing in the preliminary report indicates that the crew or flight ops thought they had an emergency on their hands.
As the aircraft continued its flight and approached the U.S.-Mexico border, a series of other fuel- and electrical-related faults annunciated. It was at this point that the Cessna Citation Latitude crew declared an emergency with Monterrey ATC in Mexico, who then handed them off to Houston ATC.
Per the preliminary report, the pilots “requested to divert” to Laredo Airport in Texas. It is not specified in the report and therefore not known whether the crew specifically used the term “emergency” with Houston ATC. The Cessna Citation Latitude crew requested a visual approach at Laredo International Airport on runway 36L with a five-mile final. However, since ATC deemed the business jet’s altitude too high, the aircraft was instead instructed to do a 14-mile loop to come back and land on runway 36L.
Human Factors and Aviation Psychology
While full timestamps are not yet available, details from the preliminary report point to initial warnings that were encountered early in the flight. After speaking with flight ops and clearing the ADC fault, the aircraft was able to continue the bulk of its leg.
More severe warnings (and eventual engine shutdown) did not occur until much later in the flight. Considering the original flight path and proximity to the United States when the emergency escalated, this suggests that the aircraft was able to safely fly for several hours after the first warning was cleared.
In aviation psychology, there is a something called the sunk cost fallacy. This is a common phenomenon whereby crew elect to continue a flight despite potentially unsafe conditions; this is typically due to various pressures such as time and money.
It must be highlighted that in the context of the Laredo crash, sunk cost fallacy does not assume that aviation personnel were fully aware of how unsafe their flight conditions were. If anything, current evidence points to the opposite.
There are also various biases in aviation psychology. Confirmation bias is the tendency to look for information that already supports a preexisting idea. Closely related is expectation bias, whereby one sees what they expect instead of what is actually evident. Then there is outcome bias, which judges a decision based on its outcome instead of the quality of the decision itself. As for automation bias, that places an undue over-reliance on automated systems over and above monitoring the aircraft itself. Lastly, authority bias influences individuals to defer to higher authorities; in this case, that may have been flight ops and ATC.
As an accident investigator with the perspective of an outsider looking in, it appears the Cessna Citation Latitude crew was not fully aware of how severe the aircraft’s condition was until it was too late. By explaining the vibration to flight ops in a rather benign fashion, all parties involved seemed to rule the incident a minor issue rather than a harbinger of deeper systemic issues.
Various aviation psychology biases may have led crew and flight ops to diagnose the vibration as a fan issue, despite there not being definitive proof of the vibration’s root cause. The crew appears to have deferred to flight ops, accepting their conclusion that there was no significant safety issue with the aircraft. Later, the crew also deferred to ATC when their original five-mile landing request was extended a whole nine extra miles.
Engineers Versus Pilots
As someone who has been on both sides of the cockpit window—both inside and outside—I understand the limitations that exist in each profession. Engineers who have never flown an aircraft may not understand what is going on in the flight deck. Meanwhile, pilots who have never designed aircraft may not be able to explain complex system architecture that goes beyond their training.
Furthermore, not every aircraft fault annunciated is labeled with text that makes it immediately obvious what the underlying aircraft issue is. Of course, warnings like “FUEL LEVEL LOW R” and “ELEC TRU FAIL R” that were later displayed to the crew clued the pilots in on the fact that something was seriously wrong. Unfortunately, however, by the time those faults came on, it was already too late. (For reference, TRU stands for Transformer Rectifier Unit and is a component that converts AC power to DC power in the event of a DC generator failure.)
The first “BOTH ON ADC 1” fault may have seemed harmless to pilots without an aeronautical systems engineering background. One cannot assume that the crew knew this fault could be indicative of an electrical issue. One also cannot assume that the crew understood the aircraft’s design well enough to know that the engine shaft cranks an accessory gearbox to allow the generator to supply electrical power, particularly in the heat of the moment. To assume even an exceptional flight crew is able to connect the dots that an ADC fault may be caused by an electrical issue that in turn could be caused by an engine or fuels issue is simply impractical.
Understanding Limitations
Even if one assumes the root cause of an issue is known, there must be an acknowledgment of limitations in what is known versus unknown. Just as I, as an accident investigator, can not claim to definitively know what caused an accident prior to the final investigation being finalized, no crew or support personnel can claim to definitively know what is causing an aircraft issue prior to final inspection on the ground.
Even if experts diagnose an issue as benign, pilots ought to operate with the understanding that those individuals only know what is being told to them, and that they are not inside the aircraft. To put it grimly, anyone outside of the aircraft giving advice does not have to live with the consequences of said advice in the same way those on board do. There may very well be instances where someone on the ground or even in the tower advises the crew to carry on when, in reality, the best action may very well be to execute an immediate emergency landing.
In an emergency, every minute counts. The Cessna Citation Latitude aircraft being advised to nearly triple its distance to a landing site while in an emergency situation is certainly noticeable. It is not known what specifically transpired between ATC in Mexico and ATC in Texas, specifically, whether or not Houston ATC knew the Cessna Citation crew needed to perform an immediate emergency landing as opposed to a less urgent diversion.
Until the final investigation report is released, it is not known whether the Cessna Citation Latitude could have safely performed an emergency landing with its originally requested five miles of clearance, or if the crew could have performed an alternate emergency landing.
Still, one can’t help but recall the infamous Flight 1549, commonly referred to as the Miracle on the Hudson. Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger defied ATC guidance when he ditched his dual-engine failed aircraft on the Hudson River.
What Can Be Learned
So what does all this translate to for the average pilot? Quite a lot, in my humble opinion.
Whenever a pilot encounters a new issue they have never experienced before, there is naturally going to be initial shock. It is important to follow the rule of aviate, navigate, and communicate. Changing the order to aviate, communicate, and navigate can unintentionally jeopardize safety.
No matter the pressures from passengers or even the crew themselves, the pilot in command must always err on the side of caution. What may seem like a harmless anomaly or minor inconvenience could actually be a sign of a more dangerous condition. Lastly, when communicating with ATC in an emergency situation—especially multiple controllers across different locations and countries—the pilot in command must always repeat the urgency of the situation and be sure to stress the term, “emergency,” over again.
Even if 99% of the time turning back early may be unnecessary, it is worth it to be conservative, as one never knows when it will be their turn to be the 1%. The pilot in command is ultimately responsible for the safety of all on board (themselves included) and may sometimes have to make the executive decision to go against what others are telling them to do.
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