LoW - Loss of Wing - Hit snowplow at closed airport - Curt Lewis

Pilots didn't know Telluride airport was closed before crashing into snowplow, NTSB report shows

No one was hurt in the 2015 crash at Telluride Regional Airport

A photo of the crashed Hawker Beechjet 400 at Telluride Regional Airport on Dec. 23, 2015.Provided by the San Miguel County Sheriff's Office

The two Mexican pilots of a jet that crashed into a snowplow in December 2015 while landing at a closed Telluride airport during a winter storm said they didn't know the airport was shuttered, according to a federal investigation.

A National Transportation Safety Board factual report on the crash, released this week, also shows that the pilots said air traffic controllers never informed them of the closure as they were cleared to approach the runway.

"Approximately at halfway of the runway ... we suddenly found a snow removal machine which was ... right on our path," the pilots wrote in a report about the crash.

No one was hurt in the Dec. 23, 2015, collision, in which authorities estimated the plane - a Hawker Beechjet 400 registered in Mexico and which was carrying five passengers and two crew - hit the plow at 100 mph. Officials say the flight was en route from El Paso, Texas, on a vacation trip.

The eight-page factual report shows the pilots knew before leaving Texas that the Telluride Regional Airport was going to be closed for several periods the day of the crash, but not when the Beechjet was expected to arrive.

The airport operator, according to the NTSB report, entered a computer notice that the airport was closed at 1:50 p.m. for snow removal. At 1:58, an air traffic controller cleared the Beechjet for an approach to the airport.

The report says the pilots did not change their radio frequency to the airport's common traffic advisory frequency.

When the airplane collided with the plow, one of its wings was sheared off and it came to rest just off the snow-covered runway. The snowplow had only minor damage.

"An airport employee told sheriff's deputies he was driving the snowplow when it was struck from behind and said he never saw the plane coming," the San Miguel County Sheriff's Office said in a news release at the time.

The sheriff's office said there were broken snow showers at the time of the crash.

"The Denver center controller position was initially staffed with a radar controller and a radar-associate controller," the report says. "Facility operating procedure requires controllers to issue appropriate (notices to airmen) to pilots. The facility added that in the past, they received a phone call from an airport operator notifying them of an upcoming NOTAM that closed the airport or a runway. However, currently, airport operators enter NOTAMs directly into the system and they do not receive the telephone call."

The NTSB report says pilots of planes heading into airports without air traffic control towers - like Telluride's - should monitor common traffic advisory frequencies when they are 10 miles from landing.

Cockpit voice recordings from the Beechjet showed the pilots were busy dealing with snowy weather - condition they were unfamiliar with - during their landing, the report shows.

Bloomberg found that Telluride Regional Airport is one of the most difficult for pilots to land at in the U.S.

The NTSB is expected to release a probable cause report, in which it rules on what led to a crash, in the coming weeks or months.