CROSSVILLE, Tenn. — A small plane went down in the Crossville area on Friday, according to the National Transportation Safety Board. The Fentress County Emergency Management Agency said the plane's pilot had died.
The NTSB said on social media that the board was investigating the crash of a Cessna 150F airplane. The small aircraft generally does not seat more than a few people.
The Federal Aviation Administration said a fatality was reported in the crash and the plane was destroyed. It also said the plane "crashed under unknown circumstances." The plane was registered to a Georgian LLC.
FlightAware data said it took off at around 4:30 p.m. Eastern Time, from Falcon Field in Peachtree. It was last seen over Crossville at around 5:21 p.m. Central Time before the crash.
The Fentress County Office of Emergency Management Agency said it received a call from the Air Command Center in Atlanta about a possible missing plane at around 9:30 a.m. on Nov. 1. It said the pilot had landed at Crossville Memorial Airport and got around 7 gallons of fuel on Oct. 31 before going back in the air.
Emergency responders received the coordinates of a locator beacon in a remote area of the Wilder community. The Fentress County EMA also said after speaking with other agencies, it could not determine if the coordinates were accurate and there appeared to be another set of coordinates in Cumberland County that was already being investigated.
They reached out to the Tennessee Air National Guard and the Tennessee Highway Patrol for help searching the area, and crews set up a command post in the Cravenstown/Sandy area.
By the afternoon of Nov. 1, a THP helicopter crew said they had found the crash site and were going to "set up to hoist a rescuer down to the site." The THP said a post-crash fire had broken out and there were no survivors, after sending crews into the site.
At around 4:50 p.m. a recovery team of 14 people from several agencies began working to recover the pilot. The pilot was taken to the forensic center in Knoxville for identification. On Monday, the aircraft was also recovered.
