Here's an update:

Fatal mix for jet: wrong turn and a turned back
Federal aviation officials acknowledged that an air-traffic controller left his post before a commuter jet crashed, killing 49 people.
BY WANDA J. DeMARZO
[email protected]

* Video | Raw Video- Comair Crash Site
The sole air-traffic controller on duty turned his back to do a ''traffic count'' as Comair Flight 5191 veered down the wrong runway Sunday in Lexington, Ky., then crashed after takeoff, leaving only one survivor -- a first officer from Broward County.

Federal Aviation Administration guidelines call for two controllers in the tower, but officials at Blue Grass Airport scheduled only one to work the shift that morning, the FAA said Tuesday.

In an interview with The Miami Herald, the mother of First Officer James Polehinke questioned why the controllers failed to notice that the plane was on the wrong runway.

''That runway had no lights. And where was the guy in the tower who should have told him he was on the wrong runway?'' said Polehinke's mother, Honey Jackson of Sunny Isles Beach.

A National Transportation Safety Board member confirmed that the flight crew received no communication from the control tower as the commuter jet headed down Runway 26 at the Lexington airport in predawn darkness.

The aircraft was supposed to take off from Runway 22, which is 7,000 feet long, but instead made a wrong turn and took off from a shorter runway used for smaller aircraft, investigators said.

Federal aviation officials said the air-traffic controller turned his back to tally the number of flights in and out of the airport, and the next thing he heard was an explosion.

FAA guidelines call for two controllers -- one to handle administrative functions and one to monitor radar. Since the crash, a second controller has been assigned for radar coverage, FAA spokeswoman Kathleen Bergen said.

Investigators are examining other factors, including runway and taxi markings and whether runway lights or a repaving project a week earlier could have played a role.

The NTSB also corrected the perception it gave earlier that Polehinke -- who was flying the plane when it crashed -- was also at the controls when it headed down the wrong runway. It was the aircraft's captain, Jeffrey Clay, who taxied the plane onto the runway. He then turned over the controls to Polehinke for takeoff, the investigator said.

The plane hit a fence and trees and crashed in a nearby field. Clay, 35, was killed, along with another crew member and 47 passengers. Polehinke was pulled from the wreckage.

Jackson returned to her son's Margate home Tuesday to care for his dogs, and planned to return to Kentucky as soon as the tropical storm lets up.

She said her son remains near death.

''He is in a coma, and every bone in his body is broken,'' Jackson said.

Polehinke's wife, Ida, and other family members are holding a vigil at the Kentucky hospital where he is on life support. Because he is in a coma, he has not been able to tell anyone what happened, his mother said.

''We all talk to him, and I know he can hear us. I feel him squeeze my hand,'' Jackson said. ``Being a pilot was his first love, his dream. He is a dedicated pilot and no one knows the truth but him and he can't tell us.''

Polehinke has experience at small airports. From 1997 to 2002, he flew short-range, twin-engine planes for Florida-based Gulfstream International Airlines. He flew at small airports in Florida and the Bahamas, starting as a first officer and getting promoted to captain in 2000.

Gulfstream director of operations Tom Herfort, a pilot for the company at the same time Polehinke was flying, said Polehinke was a solid pilot.

Polehinke was hired at Comair in 2002 and had more than 4,000 hours of flight time with the company, NTSB officials said.

'When my son sits up and says, `Hi, Mom,' then he will talk to everyone about what happened,'' Jackson said.

The Associated Press and The Lexington Herald-Leader contributed to this report.