Missouri, Jun 15 (V7N) - All twelve people on board, including eleven skydivers and the pilot, were killed after a private skydiving aircraft crashed shortly after takeoff in the US state of Missouri on Sunday (June 14).
The single-engine turboprop plane took off from Butler Memorial Airport at approximately 11:30 AM local time. According to preliminary reports, the aircraft failed to gain the required altitude to complete a turn, losing power shortly after departure. The plane stalled, plummeted nose-first into a field roughly 300 meters short of the runway, and was instantly engulfed in flames.
The aircraft was a Pacific Aerospace 750XL, a model manufactured in 2010 and widely popular for commercial skydiving operations. It was being operated by a local private company, Skydive Kansas City.
Speaking at a press conference on Sunday afternoon, Bates County Sheriff Chad Anderson expressed his grief over the incident, stating, "We are treating this as a major loss of life." He added that the flight path and surrounding areas were searched, confirming that no one on board had the opportunity to deploy a parachute before the impact.
Sheriff Anderson clarified that the aircraft was a locally based private plane rather than part of a commercial airline fleet, confirming that it had departed from the local regional airport.
The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) stated that air traffic control services were not being provided to the plane at the time of the incident. An FAA spokesperson explained that due to the unregulated nature of that specific local airspace, communication with air traffic controllers was not mandatory for the pilot.
Officials from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and the FAA have arrived at the crash site to conduct a thorough investigation into the mechanical or operational factors that led to the tragic accident.
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