Basia
Llama
- Joined
- Jul 17, 2001
- Posts
- 10,035
Do we know if anyone in the North Carolina Area had any intention of flying?
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (Jan. 8) -- CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) - A commuter plane carrying 21 people crashed into an airport maintenance hangar and burned Wednesday, killing everyone aboard, authorities said.
The plane, a Beech 1900 twin-engine turboprop, was taking off in clear, windy weather from Charlotte/Douglas International Airport when it hit the corner of a U.S. Airways hangar at full throttle just before 9 a.m., officials said.
The FBI said there was no immediate indication of terrorism.
''The plane is so destroyed there's not much to see,'' said Charlotte police spokesman Keith Bridges. ''The debris is in such bad shape.''
Nineteen passengers and two crew members were aboard Flight 5481, an Air Midwest-operated flight, Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Laura Brown said. The plane was headed to Greenville-Spartanburg, she said.
The last radio contact with the pilots was clearance for takeoff, she said.
The plane veered into the hangar, and witnesses told WCNC-TV it came down on its roof. Video from the scene after the crash showed smoldering wreckage and a charred side of the hangar.
Jonathan Ornstein, a spokesman for Mesa Airlines, which owns Air Midwest, said everyone on board the plane was killed. There were no injuries on the ground, airport director Jerry Orr said.
Randy Parker was getting out of his vehicle at the airport when he saw the plane apparently losing altitude before the crash.
''It's just a horrible sight,'' he said. ''It's just horrible.''
At Greenville-Spartanburg airport, spokeswoman Rosylin Weston said a room had been set up for friends and relatives arriving to pick up passengers from the flight.
''We clearly are deeply concerned about this event, about our crews and our passengers,'' Ornstein said from the company's headquarters in Phoenix. ''I can only express our greatest sympathy, my personal sympathy, to all those involved.''
Ornstein said the plane was about 8 years old and had 15,000 hours of flight time and 21,000 takes-offs and landings.
Mesa Air operates in the West and Midwest as America West Express, in the Midwest and East as US Airways Express, in Denver as Frontier JetExpress, in Kansas City with Midwest Airlines and in New Mexico as Mesa Airlines.
The crash comes after a year in which there were no deaths aboard a passenger or cargo airliner in the United States. It had been the third time in a decade that a year went by without a fatality on a commercial plane, according to the FAA.
Airline's toll-free number for family members: 800-679-8215
AP-NY-01-08-03 1101EST
Copyright 2003 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. All active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (Jan. 8) -- CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) - A commuter plane carrying 21 people crashed into an airport maintenance hangar and burned Wednesday, killing everyone aboard, authorities said.
The plane, a Beech 1900 twin-engine turboprop, was taking off in clear, windy weather from Charlotte/Douglas International Airport when it hit the corner of a U.S. Airways hangar at full throttle just before 9 a.m., officials said.
The FBI said there was no immediate indication of terrorism.
''The plane is so destroyed there's not much to see,'' said Charlotte police spokesman Keith Bridges. ''The debris is in such bad shape.''
Nineteen passengers and two crew members were aboard Flight 5481, an Air Midwest-operated flight, Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Laura Brown said. The plane was headed to Greenville-Spartanburg, she said.
The last radio contact with the pilots was clearance for takeoff, she said.
The plane veered into the hangar, and witnesses told WCNC-TV it came down on its roof. Video from the scene after the crash showed smoldering wreckage and a charred side of the hangar.
Jonathan Ornstein, a spokesman for Mesa Airlines, which owns Air Midwest, said everyone on board the plane was killed. There were no injuries on the ground, airport director Jerry Orr said.
Randy Parker was getting out of his vehicle at the airport when he saw the plane apparently losing altitude before the crash.
''It's just a horrible sight,'' he said. ''It's just horrible.''
At Greenville-Spartanburg airport, spokeswoman Rosylin Weston said a room had been set up for friends and relatives arriving to pick up passengers from the flight.
''We clearly are deeply concerned about this event, about our crews and our passengers,'' Ornstein said from the company's headquarters in Phoenix. ''I can only express our greatest sympathy, my personal sympathy, to all those involved.''
Ornstein said the plane was about 8 years old and had 15,000 hours of flight time and 21,000 takes-offs and landings.
Mesa Air operates in the West and Midwest as America West Express, in the Midwest and East as US Airways Express, in Denver as Frontier JetExpress, in Kansas City with Midwest Airlines and in New Mexico as Mesa Airlines.
The crash comes after a year in which there were no deaths aboard a passenger or cargo airliner in the United States. It had been the third time in a decade that a year went by without a fatality on a commercial plane, according to the FAA.
Airline's toll-free number for family members: 800-679-8215
AP-NY-01-08-03 1101EST
Copyright 2003 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. All active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.
