Amazon pauses operations with 21 Air after Miami cargo plane crash

BREAKING: Amazon pauses operations with 21 Air following the fatal Miami cargo plane crash.

Amazon has cut ties, for now, with the airline behind the fatal Miami cargo crash.

The company confirmed it's pausing all operations with 21 Air, one of the contractors flying freight for its air network, after one of the carrier's planes went down in Miami and people died on board. These are the aircraft in question, photographed at Amazon's Miami facility before the pause took hold.

Investigators are already inside the wreckage. You can see them here, working through the cockpit, trying to establish what failed and when. Until they have answers, Amazon isn't putting a single package on a 21 Air plane.

For a contractor whose business depends on that Amazon relationship, a pause like this can quietly become permanent. The people who flew that aircraft never got the chance to find out.

This is Liu Yang, reporting for HIT.