A small plane crashed soon after taking off from Chautauqua County Jamestown Airport Tuesday, killing two Canadian men aboard the aircraft.
Pilot Roger Ryall, 52, of Toronto and passenger David Hughes, also 52, from British Columbia were in the Cirrus SR22 plane flying to an airstrip in Waterloo, Canada.
Having flown out of Erie, Pennsylvania, they stopped in nearby Jamestown, New York, to refuel.
The plane departed the airport at around 1:41 p.m. Tuesday, with no indication of problems prior to its final departure and no evidence that Ryall called for help before crashing.
Jamestown resident James Mortimer was biking at the time of the incident and saw the plane having problems above the runway.
“It looked like it was climbing, like it had just taken off. Then I saw it start to make, like it was turning to the left. … It banked really steeply, like it was in a bank. I said, ‘That’s not right. That’s not good.’ I thought it was going to go down right there, but it straightened out again and it turned to the right and flew to the right,” Mr. Mortimer told The Post-Journal of Jamestown.
After flying to the right, the plane appeared to stall, neither climbing nor falling. It crashed almost immediately in a wooded area on airport grounds at 1:52 p.m.
By the time emergency crews arrived, the plane was engulfed in flames, with the remains of both victims later being recovered from the detritus.
Investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board into specific causes is ongoing.
• Brad Matthews can be reached at bmatthews@washingtontimes.com.
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