The small 7-passenger plane took off around 8am EST from Rochester New York on its way to Naples Florida. Flight control along its route last heard from the pilot about 10am EST. After that, all calls to the pilot went unanswered. The plane continued, apparently on auto pilot, prompting the government to scramble fighter jets to escort the airplane and attempt to find out what the problem was with the flight. The jets stayed with the unresponsive plane until it reached Cuban airspace.  One of the jet pilots did report that he saw an unresponsive pilot and co-pilot in the front of the plane, leading to speculation that the plane lost pressurizing causing the loss of consciousness and/or death of the crew and any passengers.

At that time, fearing misunderstanding with Cuba might result in an escalation of the situation, the fighter jets broke off their escort of the plane, a TBM-700, a light business and utility aircraft. NORAD communicated with Cuban air control. Cuba agreed with NORAD that the flight appeared to be the victim of a terrible accident and agreed to monitor it unmolested through Cuban airspace.

The plane is schedule to leave Cuban airspace shortly and, according to those familiar with this plane, will be reaching the end of its fuel capacity shortly.  Unfortunately, if the crew is incapacitated, this will result in the plane crashing into the ocean.

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