Nathalia Gadelha, a 20 year old pilot from Boca Raton, has been identified by her family as the copilot of the Learjet 60 that nosedived into a Palm Beach County neighborhood Sunday, killing all nine people on board. Her mother and stepfather confirmed her identity to the New York Post. As of Monday morning, officials had not publicly released the names of anyone who died.
The business jet took off from Austin, Texas, headed for North Eleuthera in the Bahamas. Around 12:50 p.m. Sunday, it came down along Military Trail near Greenacres, about seven miles southwest of West Palm Beach. Dashcam video shows the jet dropping nose first and exploding into a fireball just feet from passing cars, leaving a crater in the road. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis called the crash cataclysmic and said it looked like a missile coming down. He said no one on the ground was hurt. About 600 residents of a nearby mobile home community were moved to shelters while investigators work the scene.
Minutes before the crash, the crew told Miami air traffic controllers they were picking up light ice and moderate turbulence, according to a radio recording reported by CNN. After asking to climb, the crew declared a mayday. They said the jet was in an overspeed condition and dropping 20,000 feet per minute. Overspeed means the plane was moving faster than the maximum speed it is built to safely handle. Tracking data showed the jet falling about 27,000 feet in roughly one minute before the signal cut off.
Nathalia Gadelha had been chasing this career since she was a teenager. She started flight lessons in 2020, learning from her father, and earned her private pilot’s license at 17 while she was a senior at West Boca Raton High School. That was before she even had a driver’s license. Local station CBS12 featured her in October 2023, when she had already logged 88 hours in the air. Her training was funded through her school district’s Aviation Academy, and she went on to graduate from American Flyers flight school with the goal of becoming a commercial airline pilot.
Many readers may not know what a copilot actually does. The copilot, also called the first officer, is the second in command of an aircraft. Every flight has one pilot in command, the captain, who has final authority over the plane and is legally responsible for the flight under federal aviation rules. Jets like the Learjet 60 are built to be flown by two pilots, and FAA rules require the copilot to be specifically qualified to serve in that seat for that type of aircraft.
In the cockpit, the two pilots split the work. One is the pilot flying, who has hands on the controls. The other is the pilot monitoring, who handles radio calls with air traffic control, runs the checklists, watches the instruments, and speaks up when something looks wrong. Crews often trade those roles from one flight to the next, but the captain stays in command no matter who is flying.
That means Gadelha was not in charge of the aircraft. The jet had a captain, and that pilot held final responsibility for every decision made on board. Investigators have not said which pilot was at the controls when the jet began its fall, and the captain’s name has not been released. Posts on X have zeroed in on her age and experience, but no cause has been determined.
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The National Transportation Safety Board is leading the investigation with help from the Federal Aviation Administration. The team’s early work focuses on recovering the wreckage, reviewing air traffic control recordings, and studying the weather. CNN reported that storms were moving through the area and that the jet passed through a stronger cell a few minutes before it started descending, though it is not clear whether the storm played a role. The jet is registered to a Delaware company and was listed online as available for charter. The company that operated Sunday’s flight has not been named.
The NTSB usually releases a preliminary report within about 30 days of a crash. A final ruling on the cause can take a year or more. Sunday’s crash is the second deadliest aviation accident in the United States this year, behind a June skydiving plane crash in Butler, Missouri, that killed 12 people.
