Pilot Peter Siebold Tells Board That He Was Unaware That The Feather System Had Been Unlocked Prematurely

The NTSB says it has concluded the on-scene portion of the investigation into the crash of Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo, a test flight conducted by Scaled Composites, and all NTSB investigators have returned to Washington, DC.

In a news release, the Board said that its operations and human performance investigators interviewed pilot Peter Siebold on Friday. Siebold told investigators that he was unaware that the feather system had been unlocked early by the copilot. His description of the vehicle motion was consistent with other data sources in the investigation. He stated that he was extracted from the vehicle as a result of the break-up sequence and unbuckled from his seat at some point before the parachute deployed automatically.

Recorded information from telemetry, non-volatile memory, and videos are being processed and validated to assist the investigative groups.

An investigative group to further evaluate the vehicle and ground based videos will convene next week at the NTSB Recorders Laboratory in Washington, D.C.

The systems group continues to review available data for the vehicle's systems (flight controls, displays, environmental control, etc.). The group is also reviewing design data for the feather system components and the systems safety documentation.

The vehicle performance group continues to examine the aerodynamic and inertial forces that acted on the vehicle during the launch. The NTSB said that the SpaceShipTwo wreckage has been recovered and is being stored in a secure location for follow-on examination.

FMI: www.ntsb.gov