In December 2014, a plane stalled during an approach to Montgomery County Airpark and crashed into the home of the Gemmell family. Marie Gemmell, 36, died as she tried to protect her children Cole, 3, and 1-month-old Devin from the smoke and fire when the plane struck their home. The two children also died.
The family’s father Ken Gemmell and an older daughter, Arabelle, were not home during the crash.
The pilot, Dr. Michael Rosenberg, 66, and two others on the plane, David Hartman, 52, and Chijioke Ogbuka, 31, also were killed in the crash. Rosenberg was founder and CEO of Health Decisions, a clinical research organization in Durham, North Carolina.
The plane had flown from Horace Williams Airport in Chapel Hill, North Carolina and was supposed to land at Montgomery County Airpark.
According to the NTSB report, Rosenberg failed to turn on crucial deicing equipment and skipped pre-flight checks, which led to the deadly jet crash.
The NTSB issued three recommendations Tuesday: Two focused on developing automated alerts for pilots of small jets to remind them that deicing equipment should be activated, and a third focused on training.
“Lives depend on pilots’ actions,” NTSB Chairman Christopher Hart said. “Our own lives, the lives of our passengers, and the lives of people on the ground.”
There were signs the Rosenberg was rushing before takeoff and that he did not take enough time to do full pre-flight checks.
According to NTSB investigators, pilot miscalculations, the wrong flap settings, and the failure to activate deicing systems caused the plane travel more than 30 knots slower than it should have been.
By the time automated stall warnings sounded, it was too late.
Robert Sumwalt, a member of the NTSB, said that Rosenberg had been involved in a prior incident in March 2010 and said that in 2011 the pilot had violated temporary flight restrictions in restricted airspace. Sumwalt did not provide further details about the incidents during a hearing Tuesday.
Rosenberg had piloted a plane that crashed in Gaithersburg on March 1, 2010, WTOP has reported.
Investigators said the airpark was not to blame for the crash but said air traffic controllers should have communicated two reports of icing in the area to pilots prior to the crash.
Story and photo gallery: http://wtop.com
NTSB Docket And Docket Items: http://dms.ntsb.gov
MONTGOMERY CO., Md. (ABC7) — Wednesday night dozens of Montgomery County residents met to express concerns that not enough has been done since a deadly jet crash last December.
On December 8, 2014, the jet crashed short of the runway at the Montgomery County Airpark in Gaithersburg. It landed in the Hunters Woods neighborhood.
Three people on board the aircraft died, as well as three people on the ground.
The jet damaged three homes. A wing flew into a house where Marie Gemmell was inside with her two sons, 3-year-old Cole and 1-month-old Devin. All three died of smoke inhalation.
"I'm deeply saddened and disappointed that since the crash the county has done absolutely nothing to address the issue of safety," Brian Benhaim of Montgomery Village told the crowd that gathered at Wednesday night's meeting.
The meeting was organized by Montgomery County. A handout the county gave out says both the NTSB and FAA reviewed how the Airpark was run after the crash. The county is still waiting on a final NTSB report about what went wrong; it was initially expected to take around a year to complete.
In the meantime there have been no major changes at the Airpark.
Many residents say they've been concerned about both safety and noise related to the Montgomery County Airpark for years. They say pilots often fly too low.
"It's conerning to us, especially at night," said Gaithersburg resident Jennifer Etzel. "I'm sometimes in [my child's] room rocking her to sleep and those airplanes are so loud and so low over my child's bedroom."
Montgomery County says the airpark, which was opened in 1960, cannot be closed because it is part of something called the National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems.
However, many concerned residents say they're not calling for it to close. Instead they say they just want to see changes made to decrease noise -- and especially to decrease the chances tragedy will ever strike again.
At Wednesday night's meeting several pilots came out saying they wanted to remind the community about the good the airpark does, saying pilots often do charity and public safety work.
"As a pilot, I feel offended when we're being told we're not being safe," said Sandy Poe, who said her father and grandfather helped launch the airpark. "Because not all pilots are unsafe. We do our best to follow the rules and we want to make everybody a friendly community."
Source: http://wjla.com
It was a scene straight from a suburban nightmare: A plane encounters trouble while trying to land at a small airport, stutters, stalls and crashes into a house at the end of a quiet street.
Marie Gemmell, 36, her infant son, Devon, and 3-year-old son, Cole, huddled in a windowless second-floor bathroom last year in a futile attempt to escape the flames after the crash on Drop Forge Lane. Pilot Michael Rosenberg, 66, and passengers David Hartman, 52, and Chijioke Ogbuka, 31, also were killed.
Those who live near the Montgomery County Airpark in Gaithersburg are pondering the future of the airport, which was built more than half a century ago when this stretch of the county was largely undeveloped.
Even as the accident remains under investigation, the crash has caused soul-searching in this corner of Gaithersburg, which is largely defined by its proximity to the airport. On Wednesday night, about 100 residents gathered at the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission for a public forum on the airport to voice their fear, vent their frustration and express their hope for safety changes at the airport.
County officials have said that they are waiting for federal officials to complete their investigation before offering any recommendations for the airport.
“We have to let them lead,” County Council member Craig Rice (D-Upcounty), who represents Montgomery Village, said of federal investigators.
Many speakers were like Jennifer Etzel, 28, who has lived in the Hadley Farms development not far from the airport for about three years. At first, she said, she wasn’t aware that the airport was so close to her and her neighbors’ homes. Eventually the airport was a source of pride for her family and so much a part of the fabric of the community, she said, that one of her daughter’s first words was “airplane.”
But the accident, she said, “rattled us to the core.”
The Dec. 8 plane crash that killed six people was not the first at Montgomery County Airpark, but it stoked the fears of the surrounding community like no other because three of the dead were killed in their home.
The airpark opened in 1959, intended to relieve aviation congestion at Washington National Airport. At the time, the county’s population was 340,928. Since then, the county census count has grown to 1,030,447, and developments have sprung up to envelope the airport.
Between 1970 and 1990, nearby Gaithersburg grew almost fivefold, and the city’s population has reached 65,690.
A 1984 article in The Washington Post was headlined “Some critics say it’s an accident just waiting to happen,” in reference to the airpark. It quoted one man who lived nearby: “It’s inevitable that a plane will fall out of the sky.”
Since 1983, there have been 29 airplane crashes at or near the airpark, fewer than one a year. Only four resulted in injuries to the pilot or passengers. In three of them — in 1990, 1985 and 1983 — people on board died.
At the meeting, resident Scott Dyer, 36, said he was concerned for his family. He noted that some people ask why residents chose to move to an area near the airport, which had been there for many years before their arrival.
“While it was here first, it’s a very different airport than when it first opened,” he said. “The county has the responsibility for the safety and quiet enjoyment of those houses and families. It’s taken years to have a community meeting to acknowledge there are concerns only because there was finally a loss of life.”
Dyer, who lives in the area with his wife, Joy, and their 5-year-old son, said residents have prepared 16 recommendations for the airport — including noise abatement and new safety guidelines for runway departures and “touch-and-go landings,” when planes touch the runway momentarily before quickly lifting off again.
Lucy Seifert has lived near the airport for 30 years.
“I don’t mind small airplanes,” she said. “The jets are too large, and they’re getting bigger and bigger. It’s unbelievable.”
Dorothy Doyle-Wandell said she drives past the site of the accident daily on her way to work.
“There isn’t a single day that I have not thought of the Gammell family and said a prayer for them driving by that home,” she said. “My two young children , who are old enough now to be aware of the accident, they don’t know about it. Because I chose, up to this point, to shield them from it.
“I want to be able to look my children in the eyes and tell them about not only the tragedy but what the county has done in response to grow from it, to correct the situation, to make this a safer place,” she said. “We’re not there yet.”
Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com
Marie, Cole, and Devin Gemmell
Michael Rosenberg, MD, MPH: Doctor, pilot, entrepreneur, innovator.
David Hartman
Chiji Ogbuka
(The audio was posted by news helicopter pilot Brad Freitas)
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Embraer EMB-500 Phenom 100, N100EQ, Sage Aviation: Accident occurred December 08, 2014 near Montgomery County Airpark (KGAI), Gaithersburg, Maryland
http://registry.faa.gov/N100EQ
14 CFR Part 91: General Aviation
Accident occurred Monday, December 08, 2014 in Gaithersburg, MD
Aircraft: EMBRAER EMB-500, registration: N100EQ
Injuries: 6 Fatal.
This is preliminary information, subject to change, and may contain errors. Any errors in this report will be corrected when the final report has been completed. NTSB investigators traveled in support of this investigation and used data obtained from various sources to prepare this aircraft accident report.
On December 8, 2014, about 1041 Eastern Standard Time (EST), an Embraer EMB-500 Phenom 100, N100EQ, impacted terrain and houses about 0.75 miles short of runway 14 while on approach to Montgomery County Airpark (GAI), Gaithersburg, Maryland. The airline transport rated pilot and two passengers were fatally injured as well as three persons on the ground. The airplane was destroyed during the impact and ensuing fire. Marginal visual meteorological conditions prevailed at the time and the flight was operating on an instrument flight rules (IFR) flight plan. The airplane was registered to and operated by Sage Aviation LLC., of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, under the provisions of 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91 as a personal flight. The flight originated from Horace Williams Airport (IGX), Chapel Hill, North Carolina, with GAI as its intended destination.
FAA Flight Standards District Office: FAA Baltimore FSDO-07
Anderson points to highlighted sections on the map, identifying neighborhoods that have been built since the study. GAITHERSBURG, Md. -- Years before the deadly plane crash that a fire chief called "a tragedy for the county," a neighborhood group around Montgomery County Airpark warned that approaching aircraft threatened homes below.
On Monday, a small jet crashed into three homes less than a mile from the runway.
The crash killed all three people on board and three more on the ground, as one of the homes exploded in fire.
"We have a couple pilots in our group, and all of us have said it's not a question of 'if,' it's a question of 'when,'" says Bob Anderson, co-founder of the Airpark Concerned Citizens Association.
"It's been no secret," he says. "It was going to happen."
The group, which has about 50 members, has regularly raised its concerns with the Montgomery County Council.
Chief among them: Too many flights are passing over congested areas at altitudes that are below regulation.
"You have planes under full throttle on crosswinds flying over communities," says Anderson, a former pilot himself. "One stall-out, and you're going into a house."
"We've tried to get them to declare these neighborhoods congested residential communities," he says.
Also, the community group claims pilots regularly fail to follow approved flight patterns.
Anderson raises doubts about the flight patterns themselves, which were established after noise and pattern studies done in 1990 and 1993.
But 30 percent of the East Village's homes had not been built in 1990s, the group estimates. As a result, aircraft takeoffs and landings take them over neighborhoods that were undeveloped when the flight paths were approved.
Some have said, "If you don't like it, move," according to Anderson.
The group has no intention of doing that, and after Monday's crash, leaders quickly called a meeting on Tuesday.
Story, comments and photos: http://www.wtop.com
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