Questions remain after a 30-year-old man breached security measures at Salt Lake City International Airport on Monday and climbed into the engine cowling of a boarded plane before he was soon pronounced dead.
The Park City man, later identified as Kyler Efinger, apparently accessed the airfield through an emergency exit door in the terminal. Is a door all that stands between passengers and the airfield?
Airport communications director Nancy Volmer said no. There are access points between the airfield and the airport in case of emergency, but there are also additional security measures beyond the doors.
But she declined to elaborate further until Salt Lake City police and federal authorities, including the Federal Aviation Administration, National Transportation Safety Board and the Transportation Security Administration, finish their investigations.
“Some information is public. Other information is not,” Volmer said. “But I think it’s not clear to a lot of members of the media or the public on how that could happen.”
Here is what we know so far:
How did he access the airfield?
Efinger was a ticketed passenger for an outbound flight to Denver, police said. He was supposed to visit a sick grandparent, according to FOX13, who spoke with Efinger’s father.
Efinger successfully passed through a TSA checkpoint to the secure side of the airport, Volmer said. At 9:52 p.m., a store manager contacted airport control center dispatchers to report a “disturbance” involving a passenger.
“The nature of the disturbance remains under investigation,” SLCPD said in a news release.
Police arrived to investigate the disturbance, and airport control informed officers at 9:56 p.m. that Efinger had gone through an emergency exit door. Officers searched the area and couldn’t find the man.
SLCPD spokesman Brent Weisberg said it is not uncommon for passengers to accidentally lean against an emergency exit and trigger an alarm. Once officers realized that wasn’t what happened this time, the investigation began to “expand and evolve,” he said.
Officers and airport employees soon determined Efinger had gotten onto the airfield.
How did Efinger die?
At 10:04 p.m., airport employees told SLCPD that a pilot had spotted Efinger. About a minute later, SLCPD requested the FAA’s air traffic control tower be notified that a passenger had accessed the airfield.
Authorities soon found Efinger’s clothes on an airport runway, and then found Efinger himself — unconscious and “partially inside” an Airbus A220-100′s engine cowling — at one of the airport’s deicing pads.
The Delta aircraft, Airbus’s smallest jetliner, was set to depart for San Francisco, and police said its engines were rotating when investigators found Efinger.
“The specific stage of engine operation remains under investigation,” police said in a Tuesday news release.
(Delta) A Delta Airbus A220-100
Weisberg confirmed Wednesday that Efinger’s body was intact when officers pulled him from the engine cowling. Officers tried CPR and rendered naloxone, but Efinger was pronounced dead at the scene. It now is up to the medical examiner to determine Efinger’s cause and manner of death, police said.
Efinger’s father told FOX13 that Efinger seemed to be doing well when he visited with family over Christmas, and he wondered if his son had some kind of mental health episode.
Volmer said deicing pads are located away from the jet bridge and terminal area. At the Salt Lake City airport, crews load a mixture of ethylene glycol (the liquid commonly found in antifreeze) and water into trucks, then spray it onto aircraft.
(Salt Lake City International Airport) Crews deice a Delta plane at Salt Lake City International Airport.
After Efinger was found, pilots taxied the aircraft back to the gate, and its planned flight to San Francisco was canceled. According to a statement from Delta, a total of 95 passengers, three flight attendants and two pilots were on board.
“As nothing is more important than the safety and security of our customers and people, Delta is fully cooperating with all aviation authority and law enforcement investigations,” Delta said in the statement.
What happens next?
As the medical examiner works to determine how Efinger died, police and federal agencies will finish their investigations as well.
Weisberg said SLCPD will review its response to determine what went well and what didn’t, and if there are “ways to improve notifications and communications” around future episodes.
Officers will also investigate how Efinger got on to the airfield.
“Was it simply pushing through, opening the door? Was there any force used with that?” Weisberg said. He added that airport security footage has been vital to the investigation.
The National Transportation and Safety Board will also analyze the case, release a report and determine whether to recommend safety reforms based on their findings.
