MANHATTAN — Greenhill & Co. investment banker Jeffrey Buckalew, who died with his family and a colleague in a plane crash in New Jersey Tuesday, reported to air traffic controllers that the icing the was experiencing in the moments before the crash was "no problem," according to a published report.
Buckalew, who was flying the single-engine plane from Teterboro airport in New Jersey to Atlanta shortly before 10 a.m. Tuesday, can be heard telling controllers about icing conditions on the plane just before it plummeted to the ground, the New York Post reported.
Yet Buckalew said that the icing presented “no problem to us,” according to the paper.
“Seven-one-three-charlie-alpha, declaring an...” Buckalew can be heard saying moments later, right before the communication cut off, the Post reported.
The plane then plunged more than 3 miles toward the ground before crashing on Interstate 287 in New Jersey, killing all on board.
Buckalew, his wife, Corinne, their two children, Jackson and Meriwether, of the Upper East Side, and and Greenhill & Co. coworker Rakesh Chawla, of Manhattan, all died in the crash.
Investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board confirmed Buckalew’s report of the icing conditions but could not say how severe the problem became.
"How much he was picking up we don't know, and we may never know," NTSB spokesman Ralph Hicks said at a press conference Wednesday.
The plane reportedly had deicing "boots" to remove ice as it forms, but it was not immediately known if they were activated.
A full probe of the crash could take 6 to 8 months, investigators added.
