Pilot of plane that crashed in Virginia was slumped over in cockpit – reports

US media reports said the pilot of a commercial airliner was seen collapsed in the cockpit after being chased by a fighter jet before it crashed in Virginia.

Officials told the Washington Post, CNN and others.

The pilot and three other passengers died in Sunday’s crash.

The Cessna Citation flew through restricted airspace over Washington, DC, then plummeted over Virginia.

The plane, which was en route from Tennessee to Long Island, took a hairpin turn on arrival in New York and then flew south to where it left off.

As it flew over the U.S. capital, one of the most restricted areas in the country, F-16 fighter jets were cleared to fly at supersonic speeds to intercept it, causing a massive sonic boom.

The pilot remained silent for the last two hours of the flight, and the plane eventually ran out of fuel and crashed in a densely wooded mountainous area near Montebello, Virginia.

It is not clear why the pilot did not respond. Military officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the plane was not shot down and that a fighter jet did not cause the crash.

Investigators are now combing through rural Virginia, looking for wreckage described as “very fragmented.” The operation is likely to take several days, officials said.

“Everything is on the table until we slowly and methodically remove the various parts and elements associated with this safety investigation,” said Adam Gerhardt, an investigator for the National Transportation Safety Board.

A more detailed report will be published next week. A final report on the fatality is expected within 12 to 24 months.

The identities of the four dead have not been formally confirmed, but officials said family members were also on the plane.

John Rumpel, 75, a Florida business owner who owned the plane, told The New York Times that his daughter, two-year-old granddaughter and a nanny were on the plane with the pilot.

He had just returned from his home in North Carolina to East Hampton, New York.

“If you were to descend at 20,000 feet an hour and you crashed at that speed, no one would have survived,” said Rumpel, who is also a pilot, adding he hopes relatives aren’t hurt.

Retired captain and pilot instructor Richard Levy told BBC News that the Cessna may have lost cabin pressure.

Aircraft cabins can be depressurized for a variety of reasons, including mechanical failure of the aircraft and pilot error, he said.

In this case, the passenger may not have noticed symptoms of hypoxia (a condition in which the body is not getting an adequate level of oxygen), and the cabin may have been gradually depressurized “unnoticed” until it was too late. Mr Levi said.

“They don’t realize what’s going on, and they’ve gone beyond the level of rational thought, awareness, and good vision,” Levy said.

Levy said the pilot may have noticed that the plane was decompressing at some point and tried to turn the plane on the autopilot setting. “Then I’m guessing the pilot lost consciousness,” he said.