A twin-engine Beechcraft King Air medevac aircraft crashed into the Capitan Mountains near Ruidoso, New Mexico, in the early hours of May 14, 2026, killing both pilots and two flight nurses. Reporting by Wired and preliminary NTSB findings indicate GPS disruption from a military jamming exercise was active during the flight; investigators are still examining how that factor interacted with navigation decisions and air-traffic workload. It is among the most closely watched U.S. cases connecting military GPS interference to a fatal civilian crash, though final cause determinations remain pending. At the time of the flight, the U.S. Air Force's 746th Test Squadron was conducting its annual NAVFEST electronic warfare exercise at White Sands Missile Range, approximately 100 miles west of the crash site. The jamming disrupted GPS reception across a radius of up to 400 miles, according to Federal Aviation Administration notices issued for the period of May 12 through May 18.
The four occupants — Captain Keelan Clark, 30, First Officer Ali Kawsara, 23, and two nurses — were en route from Roswell to Ruidoso to retrieve a patient. The 60-mile leg normally takes half an hour in clear conditions. Eight minutes after takeoff, the crew reported loss of GPS navigation to Albuquerque Air Route Traffic Control Center. Forced to revert to ground-based radio navigation and magnetic headings — skills they rarely practiced — the pilots became disoriented in the moonless night over rural terrain. After overshooting the airport by 10 miles and opting for a visual approach toward runway lights they could see, they flew into rising terrain they could not discern in the darkness. All four died on impact.
What's New / Specs
The NAVFEST exercise at White Sands Missile Range brings together electronic warfare units from across the U.S. armed services for two weeks of testing GPS disruption technologies and countermeasures. The 2026 iteration ran from May 12 to May 18. The FAA issued a Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) warning that GPS signals could be unreliable up to 400 nautical miles from the range during the exercise window. At least ten such exercises have been conducted in the past year, reflecting the military's accelerating focus on electronic warfare as drone threats proliferate.
- Aircraft: Beechcraft King Air (twin-engine turboprop) configured for medical evacuation
- Date and time: Departure 11:52 p.m. MDT May 13; GPS loss reported at 12:00 a.m. MDT May 14; impact approximately 12:15 a.m.
- Route: Roswell (ROW) to Ruidoso (SRR), New Mexico — approximately 60 nautical miles
- Crew: Captain Keelan Clark (commercial license 1.5 years, upgraded to captain one month prior), First Officer Ali Kawsara (two months on the job, prior cargo experience only), two flight nurses
- Navigation systems affected: GPS-dependent RNAV (Area Navigation) approaches and en route navigation; ILS (Instrument Landing System) at Ruidoso remained available but required controller vectors
- Military unit: 746th Test Squadron, 704th Test Group, U.S. Air Force
- Exercise: NAVFEST (annual Navigation Festival electronic warfare exercise)
- Jamming radius: Up to 400 miles per FAA NOTAM
- Other affected aircraft: At least three other aircraft reported GPS loss and requested assistance from Albuquerque Center during the same period
The pilots initially requested an RNAV approach to Ruidoso, which requires GPS. When that became unavailable, they switched to an ILS approach, which uses ground-based radio signals. However, Albuquerque Center was simultaneously handling three other aircraft that had also lost GPS, which, according to reporting, delayed vectoring for the King Air. By the time the crew requested and received clearance for a visual approach, they had drifted north of the airport. The visual approach took them toward runway lights visible 31 miles away, but the Capitan Mountains — rising to 10,000 feet — lay directly in their path. In the moonless night, the mountain's silhouette blended with the darkness until it obscured the valley lights, by which point the aircraft was committed to a collision course.
Why It Matters
The Ruidoso crash illustrates a systemic vulnerability emerging at the intersection of modern military electronic warfare and civilian aviation's near-total dependence on GPS. Since 2023, commercial and general aviation operating over the Middle East, Black Sea, and Baltic regions have experienced persistent GPS jamming and spoofing linked to conflict zones. The International Air Transport Association and European Union Aviation Safety Agency have documented thousands of disruption events. In the United States, the problem has moved from theoretical to operational. In March 2025, airliners approaching Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport received false collision-avoidance alerts and aborted landings; the source was later traced to Secret Service electronic warfare testing at the vice president's residence. In 2026, two separate incidents in West Texas involving U.S. Army and Customs and Border Protection drone operations prompted airspace closures and commercial flight disruptions.
Medevac operations are uniquely exposed. The law firm Kreindler, which specializes in aviation litigation, notes that medevac accident rates more closely resemble combat aviation than civil aviation. Flights are dispatched on short notice, often to unfamiliar airports, in marginal weather, with crews under pressure to complete the mission. The Ruidoso crew faced multiple compounding factors: a nearly moonless night over featureless terrain (described by pilot and podcast host Juan Browne as "a black hole"), a captain with 18 months of total commercial experience and one month as captain, a first officer with two months on the job, and a sudden loss of the primary navigation system they were trained to rely on. The backup systems — VOR/DME radio beacons and magnetic compass navigation — require continuous practice to maintain proficiency, which modern training curricula rarely emphasize.
The economic and regulatory implications are significant. Airlines and operators have adapted to GPS disruptions by carrying inertial reference systems and training for RNAV-to-conventional transitions, but these mitigations add cost and complexity. The FAA's NextGen modernization program is predicated on GPS as the primary navigation infrastructure. Todd Humphreys, professor of aerospace engineering at the University of Texas at Austin and a leading GPS security researcher, warns that "when alarms go off routinely in the cockpit, and when pilots learn to disregard key readings from their instruments because the readings can't be trusted, we're a long way from normal operation." He assesses that commercial aviation may face "a mild-and-increasing risk situation" for five years or more as the industry's slow adaptation cycle collides with escalating electronic warfare activity.
Our Take
The Ruidoso tragedy was not inevitable, but it was foreseeable. The military's need to test electronic warfare capabilities is legitimate; drone threats are real and growing, and exercises like NAVFEST are essential to maintaining readiness. However, the current coordination framework between the Department of Defense and the FAA appears insufficient. A NOTAM warning of 400-mile GPS degradation is a blunt instrument — it informs operators that disruption may occur, but it does not prevent aircraft from entering affected airspace, nor does it guarantee that air traffic control resources will be adequate to handle multiple simultaneous GPS-loss events. On the night of May 13, according to Wired's account of the radio traffic and NTSB preliminary timeline, Albuquerque Center was simultaneously assisting multiple aircraft that had also lost GPS.
Civilian aviation's GPS dependency is a single point of failure that has been recognized for decades. The FAA has mandated retention of ground-based navigation infrastructure (VORs, DME, ILS) as a backup, but the network has been thinned, and pilot proficiency in non-GPS navigation has atrophied. The solution is not to halt military exercises but to invest in resilient navigation: enhanced inertial systems, terrestrial augmentation (e.g., eLORAN or similar), and mandatory recurrent training in conventional navigation for all instrument-rated pilots. Until then, every NAVFEST and every anti-drone operation near civilian airspace carries a non-zero probability of another Ruidoso.
FAQ
What caused the Ruidoso medevac crash?
According to Wired's reconstruction and preliminary NTSB reporting, the sequence included military GPS jamming during the NAVFEST exercise at White Sands Missile Range, the crew's loss of primary GPS navigation, concurrent GPS-loss traffic that strained controller assistance, and a visual approach in moonless conditions over mountainous terrain. A final official cause finding had not closed the case at the time of writing.
Was the military exercise publicly announced?
Yes. The FAA issued a Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) for May 12–18, 2026, warning that GPS signals could be unreliable up to 400 miles from White Sands Missile Range during the NAVFEST exercise. The NOTAM is standard procedure for such events.
How common are military GPS jamming exercises in the U.S.?
According to the Wired investigation, the U.S. military has conducted at least ten GPS jamming exercises in the past year. NAVFEST is an annual two-week event, but other units conduct smaller-scale tests. The frequency is increasing as electronic warfare becomes a higher priority.
Could the pilots have avoided the crash using backup navigation?
In principle, yes. The King Air was equipped for ILS approaches, which use ground-based radio signals unaffected by GPS jamming. However, executing an ILS approach requires controller vectors to intercept the localizer, and Albuquerque Center was managing three other GPS-loss emergencies simultaneously. The pilots also had VOR/DME capability, but proficiency in traditional radio navigation has declined industry-wide as GPS has become primary.
What is being done to prevent future incidents?
The FAA and DoD are reviewing coordination procedures for electronic warfare exercises. The aviation industry is accelerating deployment of multi-constellation GNSS receivers, inertial navigation upgrades, and terrestrial backup systems. However, regulatory and procurement cycles are slow; experts like Todd Humphreys estimate a five-year or longer transition period before systemic resilience improves significantly.
