“Stolen” Westwind Crashed On Takeoff From Abaco, Two Killed.

[FlyingElvii]

Ok, this is a weird one, and it gets weirder the more I look into it.

An IAB Westwind, N790RJ, crashed on takeoff from Treasure Cay on July 5th. It had arrived 3 days earlier.

Problem is, N790RJ is a current registration for a UH-1 Helicopter owned by the King’s County Sherrif’s Department in Seattle. The plane departed TC after someone realized that the registration was funky.

Initial report:

 

[TrueCourse]

Transposed letters. It’s N790JR that crashed.

 

[flybill]

It was reportedly stolen according to local news. Eyewitness reports said it struggled to get off the runway. Odd one for sure…

 

[Kristin]

The other version of: Fly It Like You Stole It!

 

[Capngrog]

It's interesting that the airplane was reported stolen. I just did a little bit of googol Internet snooping and found that the registered owner, Transenergie, Inc., is a registered Texas corporation with an address of 2007 Palm Court, Houston, Texas. This address is a large house (mansion?) located in a fancy subdivision just west of Houston. The corporation is apparently pretty much of a "one man band" type with only one man filling several positions (director and agent). The company was incorporated in July of 2013, but had its status changed from "active" to "in existence" earlier this year. I don't detect anything illegal here, but Bahamian authorities obviously have more information on this situation than I have. Perhaps (warning - mindless speculation) the "Corporation" didn't pay landing fees or something, raising the ire of local officials. The airplane also was issued its registration certificate in May of this year.

Cheers,
Grog

 

[Clip4]

Repo gone wrong maybe.