John I. Leonard High School Is Closed Monday as Crews Work the Learjet Crash Site Half a Mile Away
The Palm Beach County School District closed John I. Leonard High School for Monday in an 8 p.m. Sunday statement: emergency crews and investigators are still working the Military Trail crash site, within half a mile of the Greenacres campus and its roughly 2,800 students.
John I. Leonard High School will not open on Monday. The Palm Beach County School District announced the closure in a statement issued at 8 p.m. Sunday, saying the Greenacres school will remain closed as emergency crews continue to respond to the aircraft crash just off campus — a Learjet 60 that came down at 12:50 p.m. Sunday near Military Trail and 10th Avenue North, within half a mile of the school at 4701 10th Avenue North, killing all nine people aboard.
The crash scene is the reason the campus stays dark. The impact cratered the roadway and scattered debris extensively, and the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office has closed all lanes of Military Trail in the area of Cresthaven Boulevard and 10th Avenue North while investigators work. The Federal Aviation Administration said the jet had departed Austin-Bergstrom International Airport bound for North Eleuthera Airport in the Bahamas; the FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board will investigate, with the NTSB in charge of the inquiry and all official updates.
Leonard, with roughly 2,800 students, is the only district school closed for the crash. All other Palm Beach County district schools are expected to open Monday, though officials warned that torrential rain expected through Sunday night could delay some buses in the morning. Every district school is already out on Tuesday, November 3, for Election Day. The district named no date for Leonard to reopen and said further updates would come — for Leonard families, Monday's plan is simply this: there is no school, and the roads around the campus are part of a crash investigation.
