In August 2011, James Freudenberg was piloting a LifeNet medical helicopter carrying a patient and two nurses when the craft ran out of gas and crashed. All passengers died, reports Gawker.com
It has emerged that on the day of the crash, Freudenberg exchanged over 240 texts with a colleague, many of which were sent as he was prepping the helicopter for take-off and flying.
Bill Bramble, a U.S. National Transportation Safety Board aviation expert said:”It is easy to imagine that some of these interruptions could have led to forgetting of steps, including checking the fuel level, performing the preflight.”
The NTSB also said that texting wasn’t the only cause of the crash, however. Freudenberg filed a false report about the levels of fuel aboard, and had also complained of being overtired.
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