The Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSB) has recovered the cockpit voice and flight data recorders from the MHIRJ CRJ900 that crashed while landing at Toronto Pearson International airport on 17 February.
The TSB has sent the recorders to its laboratory for analysis, Ken Webster, the TSB’s manager of regional operations in Ontario, said during a brief accident investigation update on 18 February.
He also broadly described the accident sequence, saying the jet “impacted the runway during landing”.
Following this initial impact, parts of the aircraft separated and a fire ensued,” says Webster. “The fuselage came to rest slightly off the right side of the runway, upside down.”
The aircraft, operated by Endeavor Air, a Delta Air Lines subsidiary, had been operating flight 4819 from Minneapolis.
All 80 people aboard the aircraft evacuated from the overturned fuselage. Twenty people were hospitalised following the crash, though 19 had been released as of the morning of 18 February, Delta said.
The TSB has not disclosed further details about the incident, but video posted on social media shows the last few seconds of the flight.
Following a normal-seeming, wings-level approach, the aircraft slammed into the runway. The gear appears to have collapsed and the aircraft turned onto its right side, coming to rest inverted, the video shows.
