BREAKING: The NTSB has opened the investigative docket for Hall of Fame pitcher Roy Halladay's fatal plane crash from Nov. 2017. Among the findings, were the injuries Halladay was dealing with before the crash and a detailed account of all the drugs in his system.
Of note:
Of note:
Harry Leroy Halladay Jr. (Halladay's father) told the NTSB he was "concerned that Roy was abusing prescription medications, and that may have played a role in the accident. ... Roy was enrolled in an in- house detox program for an addiction to Lorazepam."
"Mr. Halladay talked to Roy when he received the new A5 about three weeks prior to the accident, and he asked him “what is the situation with medication? You cannot mix that with flying.” Roy said that he wasn’t taking any medication."
"Mr. Halladay stated that Roy was suffering from anxiety and depression. He believes much of his stress was due to marital problems. He said that Roy had not been himself for several years."
Per the record of the conversation with the NTSB, Halladay's father said the only medical conditions he's aware his son had were "back pain, shoulder surgery and anxiety. Mr. Halladay did not know which doctors Roy was seeing for treatment or prescriptions."
Roy Halladay tweet from the docket:
Birds weren't a factor in the crash per analysis.
The NTSB's information from the docket on the drugs in his system doesn't shed much new light. (This is just the factual report.) The final report — likely to be released within the next two months — should put this all in context. I covered this before: usatoday.com/story/sports/m…
One major hurdle for investigators is determining the concentration of all the drugs in Halladay's system: amphetamine, zolpidem (Ambien) fluoxetine (Prozac), baclofen (muscle relaxer) and hydromorphone (opioid pain killer and likely source of morphine in his system).
First, the tox results largely come from blood drawn from Halladay's upper-body, which sustained significant damage. (Blunt-force trauma was the cause of death.) That can skew the levels identified; drawing the blood from the extremities would have led to more accurate results.
Second, we don't have a full account of how long Halladay was using all these drugs. Users develop tolerances. His father said Halladay did an "in-house detox program" for the anxiety drug Lorazepam. The NTSB doesn't have his medical records from 2016-17.
So, really, we are going to have to wait for the final report – and then there still could be a lot left unanswered. It won't change the fact that Hallday's family and the baseball word lost somebody so young.
