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EYEWITNESS LOCAL NEWS
PLANE CRASH INVESTIGATIONfrom Eyewitness News Online Six Victims Unidentified
Reported by:
Videographer: Aaron Smeltzer Web Producer: Bryant Somerville Updated: February 1, 2009 10:52pm
"The airplane is completely fragmented," Brian Rayner said. "The engines are separated from their mounts, the wings are broken into several pieces, the propellers are separated from their engines and the cockpit in the cabin area is completely destroyed and deformed."
Broken remains are all that's left of a plane crash that killed six people. "We don't have positive identifications on any of the occupants and I wouldn't speak to their identities anyway," Rayner said. Rayner is with the National Transportation Safety Board and says now that the bodies have been taken to the State Medical Examiner's Office, the investigation into the plane crash can now begin. Rayner says with the exception of one propeller blade, the wreckage from the plane is all in one general area on a hillside just off of Plymale Branch Road. He says the next step is to collect all of the parts and all of the evidence that they can for examination, trying to pinpoint all the little details leading up to the crash. Rayner says it's a lengthy process that could even take up to one year. "All we know for sure was that this was not their destination," Kevin Price said. Price is the Head of Operations at Tri-State Airport and says the pilot contacted flight control about 15 minutes before the crash, saying they were dangerously low on fuel. After arriving on scene, he knew it was more of a recovery effort and not a rescue. "We had the three initially that were easily identifiable," he said. "As the recovery proceeded, the other three were discovered entangled in the wreckage." A wreckage that investigators are hoping will bring answers sooner, rather than later. Rayner says so far there have been no logbooks for the flight, meaning it's still unclear where the plane was coming from, and where it was headed.
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