A loud explosion was heard by inhabitants throughout northern Virginia, Washington D.C., and Maryland on a Sunday afternoon. This was the result of the U.S. military intercepting a non-communicative twin-engine Cessna Citation V aircraft en route to the nation’s capital, which had led to a perilous situation.
The loud boom that was heard across the DMV area was caused by an authorized DOD flight. This flight caused a sonic boom. That is all the information available at this time.
— Annapolis OEM (@AnnapolisOEM) June 4, 2023
Subsequent investigations divulged that the aircraft was owned by John Rumpel, a prominent donor to Trump, with his entire family on board. Rumpel confirmed to the Washington Post that his daughter, along with his two granddaughters, were passengers on the flight, which is currently under investigation. Tragically, his daughter and granddaughter, along with two other individuals lost their lives in this “ghost plane” crash.
When speaking to the New York Times, Rumple, who is a pilot himself, expressed his limited knowledge about the incident, however, he speculated that the aircraft might have suffered a pressurization failure. As he spoke, his voice began to crack, while expressing his hope that his family did not experience pain amidst the wreckage.
Rumple added that if the plane had lost pressurization,
“They all just would have gone to sleep and never woke up.”
Rumpel’s wife, Barbara Weimer Rumpel, would confirm the tragic news on her Facebook account, writing:
“My family is gone, my daughter and granddaughter.”
Sadly, this is not the first time they have experienced such a loss. Sadly, this is not the first time they have experienced such a loss. Almost three decades, their other daughter also passed away in a scuba-diving accident.
In honor of their late daughter, they purchased a building and converted it into Victoria Landing, an assisted living facility. As stated on its website, “John commemorates his daughter’s memory with the Victoria Landing name, a commitment that comes with the responsibility to strive for excellence at Victoria Landing… as a tribute to Victoria and in celebration of what life can and ought to be.”
The incident necessitated the deployment of F-16 fighter jets from Joint Base Andrews, causing a sonic boom that reverberated throughout the region. The unresponsive aircraft, identified as a civilian Cessna, had an unconscious pilot at the helm. The military jets escorted the plane until it crashed into the mountains of the Virginia countryside, resulting in the death of all occupants on board.
According to Fox News:
In order to catch up with the plane, the jets were authorized to fly at supersonic speeds, and the sonic boom came from the two F-16 jets out of Andrews. The civilian plane was intercepted at 3:20 p.m. and fighter pilots reported the pilot of the Cessna was unresponsive.
NORAD also said they continued to try and establish contact with the Cessna pilot up until the plane crashed near the George Washington National Forest in Virginia. NORAD also said people on the ground may have seen flares used while trying to intercept the plane. The flares, NORAD said, burn out quickly and completely, so there was no danger to the people on the ground.
According to the Federal Aviation Administration, a Cessna Citation that took off from Elizabethton, Tennessee, bound for Islip, New York, crashed in the sparsely populated town of Montebello, Virginia, around 3 p.m. There were four people on board.
Virginia State Police said search efforts began immediately by air and on foot with the Augusta County Sheriff’s Office and Augusta County Fire-Rescue after a notification at 3:50 p.m. reported a possible plane crash in the Staunton/Blue Ridge Parkway region.
Search efforts were suspended shortly before 8 p.m. Sunday after first responders reached the crash site by foot and found no survivors, Virginia State Police confirmed to Fox News Digital.
The politically active Rumpel family, known for their substantial contributions to Republican candidates for federal office, notably donated $250,000 to the Trump Victory PAC in 2020.
Barbara Rumpel, a fervent supporter of gun rights, has been a member of the NRA’s Women’s Leadership Council since 2002.
The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board are currently conducting a thorough examination of the crash.
