 The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was the flight crew members ' failure to use available cues and aids to identify the airplane 's location on the airport surface during taxi and their failure to cross @-@ check and verify that the airplane was on the correct runway before takeoff . Contributing to the accident were the flight crew 's nonpertinent conversations during taxi , which resulted in a loss of positional awareness and the Federal Aviation Administration 's failure to require that all runway crossings be authorized only by specific air traffic control clearances . 
