Maintenance failures cited in fatal plane crash that triggered sonic boom

Washington Post

14-05-2025

A private jet that crashed outside D.C. two years ago was flying without sufficient emergency oxygen, federal investigators concluded. The pilot's unresponsiveness prompted a sonic boom heard across the region as the military scrambled to intercept the mystery plane.
The National Transportation Safety Board's final report on the accident, which killed the pilot and all three passengers, leaves some questions unanswered. Investigators concluded that the pilot passed out after the plane lost pressure, though the reasons remain a mystery. But the lack of extra oxygen contributed to the crash, according to investigators, who also highlighted unaddressed maintenance issues with the plane.
The board's final report, released Tuesday, said the Cessna Citation's owner failed to repair problems identified by mechanics weeks before the flight, 'including several related to the pressurization and environmental control system.' The plane probably lost cabin pressure, the report says, causing the pilot and passengers to lose consciousness and the plane to travel on autopilot for about two hours until it crashed in the Virginia mountains.
Responsibility for those issues was disputed in interviews this week by the owner, whose daughter and granddaughter were on the plane, and the man who sold him the plane weeks before the June 4, 2023, crash.
'It had to be the prior owner,' said John Rumpel. A bill of sale for the 11-seat jet is dated April 17, 2023, according to registration records. 'I was never made aware of any problems; if I was, I certainly would not have put my daughter on it.'
The NTSB cited an inspection the month after Rumpel bought the plane that identified 26 issues, 'including the emergency exit door seal sticking out of the airplane, improper installation of the humidity regulator, and improper securing of the cabin temperature sensor.' The report says 'the airplane owner declined to address these items.' The plane's pilot told mechanics that he had concerns with how the plane had been inspected and maintained before the sale, and that it had a warranty, according to documents released by the NTSB.
The previous owner, Sheldon B. Gosney, said the plane was 'in perfect condition' when he sold it to Rumpel. If the sale had not gone through, he said, he planned to fly it to Alaska for a family vacation. 'I would have flown my family in it anywhere,' Gosney said.
'But I always check my oxygen before leaving Mother Earth,' he added.
According to the NTSB, the plane lacked enough supplemental oxygen to help the plane's occupants in the event that pressure was lost.
The pilot, Jeff Hefner, probably lost consciousness within minutes of leaving a small airport near the Rumpel family's summer home in Banner Elk, North Carolina, officials said. Hefner stopped responding to air traffic control instructions as the plane climbed to 34,000 feet; it continued toward its destination in East Hampton, New York, before turning around and heading south.
Its passage over the restricted D.C. airspace without any communication led military fighter jets to be sent out to intercept it at a speed faster than sound, triggering a sonic boom that could be heard for miles. Some of those pilots were able to see that Hefner was slumped over in the pilot's seat; they could not see the passengers or get any response from inside the plane.
Within two minutes of the jets' observation, the Cessna spiraled out of the air at high speed, hitting a mountain near the George Washington National Forest and bursting into flames.
The NTSB did not give a definitive cause for the crash. The mountainous terrain of the site made investigating the crash difficult. There was no flight data recorder, and no cockpit voice recorder was recovered. But 'contributing to the accident was' the decision 'to operate the airplane without supplemental oxygen,' the report says.
The plane also lacked a pilot-side oxygen mask days before the crash, according to the NTSB; Rumpel said he bought Hefner a new one shortly before the flight. The Air Force pilots who could see into the plane saw no oxygen masks deployed, and the passenger masks were found at the crash site still attached to their boxes.
According to the NTSB interviews, Hefner was planning to have the plane taken in for some repairs the week after the crash but expressed no concerns the day of the flight.
Above 30,000 feet, Hefner might have had as little as 30 seconds to respond to the lack of oxygen before becoming incapacitated, the NTSB said.
The 2023 summer vacation was Rumpel's first using the Cessna, he said. He took the plane from Florida to North Carolina, then sent it to pick up his daughter, Adina Azarian, in New York. Azarian, her 2-year-old daughter, Aria, and their nanny, Evadnie Smith, were headed back to their home in East Hampton when the plane crashed.
Hefner was an experienced and conscientious pilot who had flown tens of thousands of hours for Southwest Airlines, former clients and colleagues said.
Smith, 56, was a 'chef at heart' who supported many relatives in her home country of Jamaica and hoped to retire there soon, her son told the Jamaica Gleaner after the crash. 'It just hurt me that she had to go this way,' he said.
Rumpel and his wife adopted Azarian, 49, when she was 40 years old. The real estate agent reminded them of their first daughter, Victoria, who died in a scuba diving accident at age 19. 'They had the same fire in their bellies, and they were loving, caring children,' Rumpel said after the crash in 2023. 'We had no one else, and we loved her.'
Though there was barely anything left of his daughter and granddaughter to bury, he purchased three burial plots in East Hampton for their remains so they would have additional room. 'She wouldn't have wanted the three graves; she wouldn't have wanted to take up the ground,' he said, referring to his daughter. 'But I loved her that much.'
Gosney said he felt for the Rumpel family's loss — 'but I don't feel responsibility for it.'