Prior damage to the landing gear on a private jet owned by Mötley Crüe singer Vince Neil could have contributed to a fatal crash earlier this month, according to a preliminary report released Thursday by the National Transportation Safety Board.
Months before the aircraft veered off a runway in Arizona and hit a business jet, killing one person, the same flight crew had a landing issue with the Learjet in Oklahoma in June 2024. The jet took a hard landing, causing both left main landing gear tires to burst.
The pilot hired a mechanic to perform a hard landing inspection, which prompted the removal of both main landing gear for the inspection, according to the report.
Later that year, another mechanic noted that the left landing gear took an “excessive” amount of grease, but nothing appeared “unusual," the report said. The flight crew didn’t make any radio calls indicating there was a possible problem with the landing gear.
“That's kind of a red flag,” said Erwin Winkler, chief flight instructor and director of maintenance at Tucson Flight School, referring to extraordinary amount of grease.
The NTSB said the landing gear has disconnected from the airframe in at least three other events because a certain bolt was not properly engaged through a pin.
It looks like the pin, which the grease must flow through, might have not been installed correctly, Winkler said.
The fatal crash killed 78-year-old Joie Vitosky, one of the two pilots on board, according to the Scottsdale Police Department.
The plane was in Florida the morning of the accident and stopped to refuel in Austin, Texas, before flying to Scottsdale, according to the NTSB.
"The airplane traveled over the rock-covered runway-safety-area islands located between the runway and taxiways," according to the report. "The airplane crossed Taxiway Bravo, collided with the windsock, and entered the ramp area where it struck the right side of a parked Gulfstream G200."
Preston Westmoreland, a radio personality and former pilot, said he's not surprised by the accident because the plane’s retractable landing gear is more fragile than planes with fixed landing gear.
“With a hard landing, sometimes you just don’t know whether or not there are cracks on the spar or any of those pieces that attach the landing gear and come up," Westmoreland said.
A finalized report from the NTSB is expected sometime next year.
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