Reported by BBC World
The NTSB found "the majority" of the Learjet's left elevator - a control surface located on the tail - in three pieces, NTSB member Tom Chapman said
Crucial components of a private jet that crashed in Palm Beach, Florida - including a part that controlled the up-and-down movements of the nose of the plane - were found 1.3 (2 km) to 3.8 miles away from the crash site, an investigator said on Tuesday.
National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigators said they believed parts of the jet may have broken off before the Sunday crash, which killed all nine on board.
More from the original report
The NTSB found "the majority" of the Learjet's left elevator - a control surface on the tail - in three pieces, NTSB board member Tom Chapman said.
Chapman said because the parts were "quite some distance away" from the site, investigators determined they fell off before impact.
Three years before crash, young co-pilot spoke of earning pilot licence
"Knowing that it was lost is a very important piece of evidence in terms of pointing us towards other things to investigate," he said.
Chapman said officials were still working out whether losing the left elevator caused the plane to nosedive or whether the part fell off because "forces on the aircraft caused that to separate".
He said the part of the plane that controls upward and downward movement may not have been "effective" at the speed the plane was travelling.
The Learjet 60 was bound for the Bahamas from Austin, Texas, when it nosedived into a multi-lane highway and exploded on impact.
In air traffic control audio recordings, someone in the cockpit can be heard reporting "moderate turbulence" and that the crew was "managing the ice".
They are then heard saying the plane was "picking up precipitation" and "we need to climb". Moments later, the same voice said the plane was descending at a rate of 10,000ft (3,048m) per minute.
An emergency was declared and the pilots can be heard yelling "we are in an overspeed condition descending 20,000ft per minute", before saying, "we are going to crash into the ground".