They would get it within a minute. Tuesday Flight 1420 crashed as it attempted to land at the Little Rock airport. Winds were approximately 43 mph, according to airport data. Wednesday winds reached 87 mph at the Little Rock airport. Barry Beck, chief flying instructor at Central Flying Service in Little Rock and a pilot for 10 years, speculated Wednesday that wind shear could be at fault.
Wind shear is a change in the force or direction of wind from one atmospheric level to the next.
As Beck explained it, the wind the plane was flying into as it approached Adams Field may have been significantly stronger than the wind it faced as it lowered to the ground for landing. Or the wind above may have been blowing against the plane while the lower air may have been blowing behind or against the plane. Either way, Buschmann may not have been able to adjust the plane's speed quickly enough to compensate for the difference before touching down. Paul Takemoto, FAA spokesman said the Little Rock airport uses a low-level wind shear alert system. Six sensors 50-150 feet high and placed in different parts of the airfield measure winds and trigger a wind shear alert if there is a wind difference of 13 knots from one sensor to another.