Florida, plane crash at Mar-a-Lago: 9 dead. DeSantis: "Catastrophic accident"

A private plane crashed in Florida killing nine people. The aircraft crashed on Sunday 1 November in a residential area a few kilometers from Mar-a-Lago, where US President Donald Trump's residence is located.

The plane, a Learjet 60 which departed from Austin, Texas, was headed to the Bahamas but lost altitude and crashed near the Cresthaven neighborhood in Palm Beach County. There were no survivors: all nine passengers lost their lives. “Today's plane crash in Palm Beach County is a terrible tragedy,” said Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, confirming the death toll.

“A catastrophic plane crash,” declared Florida governor Ron DeSantis, arriving at the crash site. "It looked like a missile falling," he added, specifying that there were no injuries on the ground. For safety, the approximately 600 residents of the area were evacuated and temporarily transferred to shelters, as reported by Palm Beach County Commissioner Joel Flores.

President Trump was not at Mar-a-Lago at the time of the accident, having taken off about an hour earlier to return to the White House. Meanwhile, some videos of the accident are circulating on social media: the images show the plane falling vertically at high speed.

The American aeronautical authorities of the Federal Aviation Administration have opened an investigation to ascertain the causes of the accident. Meanwhile, an audio piece has been published on the specialized website LiveATC.net which reconstructs the moments preceding the impact: it is the last emergency call to the air traffic controller made from the cockpit of the private aircraft.

"Mayday, mayday, we are descending at 10,000 feet per minute," says a female voice who, initially, does not report the ongoing turbulence and states that the crew is "managing the icing". Shortly afterwards, the same voice announces that the plane has entered "an area of ​​precipitation" and must increase altitude.

Then, however, the situation suddenly becomes complicated: "Emergency situation, we are at excessive speed", the woman shouts, specifying that the aircraft is now losing altitude at a rate of "20 thousand feet per minute", over 6 thousand metres.

“The altitude is up to you, tell me what you need,” replies the air traffic controller. “We're about to crash into the ground,” the woman replies before communications cut out.