The pilot, who was rescued dead from the wreck on Monday after the crash of a Cessna 206 in a forest area near the Michelstadt district of Vielbrunn, contrary to initial reports, did not climb up alone from the Vielbrunn airfield.
According to new findings from the police and public prosecutor's office, the 66-year-old pilot from North Rhine-Westphalia initially let six parachutists jump out of the machine without complications.
Jochen Remert
Airport editor and correspondent Rhein-Main-Süd.
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However, the machine normally only offers space for five passengers.
Immediately after the passengers jumped off, the investigators assumed that a technical defect had apparently occurred, which led to the crash of the plane.
The machine burst into flames on impact.
Clarification will take months
It will take months before the cause of the accident has been clarified beyond doubt, as a spokesman for the responsible public prosecutor's office in Darmstadt said when asked.
The public prosecutor's office currently sees no evidence that a medical emergency could have led to the crash.
Therefore, according to the information, no autopsy of the body was ordered.
As always in such cases, the Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigation from Braunschweig has started its work.
As the Braunschweig experts always emphasize, this work initially only consists of clarifying the exact course of the impact based on the traces of the accident.
Statements about the cause of the accident would only be made in a later step of the joint investigative work with the public prosecutor.
The aircraft involved in the accident is a Cessna type 206. The series was introduced at the beginning of the 1960s and built with modifications until 1986.
In 1998 production of the aircraft, which was considered to be very robust, was resumed.