Pilot Killed In Cape Air Crash
Explosion Heard On Martha's Vineyard
WEST TISBURY, Mass. -- A pilot was killed Friday night in the crash of a small Cape Air plane on Martha's Vineyard.
FAA spokeswoman Holly Baker said the pilot was the only person aboard the Cessna 402 aircraft, Flight 1055. She said it went down at about 8:05 p.m. in West Tisbury shortly after leaving the Martha's Vineyard airport en route to Boston's Logan International Airport.
Cape Air spokeswoman Michelle Haynes told the Cape Cod Times the plane took off from Runway 33 on its way to pick up passengers at Logan, and crashed on land about 2 miles from Nip-N-Tuck Farm. She said airport officials reported heavy rain and high winds at the time the plane took off, but she had no information on the cause of the crash.
The airline did not immediately return a call for comment to The Associated Press.
State police identified the pilot of the six passenger, twin-engine plane as 61-year-old David D. Willey of Vineyard Haven.
State Police Lt. Eric Anderson said crash debris did some damage to a nearby house, but no one on the ground was injured. The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating.
Cape Air grounded its Cessna 402 fleet for a few days in June 2007 to replace potentially faulty engine crankshaft counterweights that were suspected of premature wear after three engine failures, none of led to accidents.
The Cape Cod Times reported that in February 2005, cracks were found in wing parts on two aircraft owned by Island Airlines and Cape Air. The FAA ordered emergency inspections of the Cessna 402 and other 400-series Cessnas and four months later directed aircraft operators to buttress the planes' wings.
In January 2001, a Cape Air pilot and his only passenger were injured when a Cessna 402C crashed just short of the Martha's Vineyard Airport on a flight from T.F. Green Airport in Warwick, R.I.
According to its Web site, the Hyannis-based regional airline operates a fleet of more than 50 Cessna 402s and carried more than 650,000 passengers last year. It operates flights in New England between Boston, Cape Cod, southeastern Massachusetts, Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket and the Providence, R.I. area. It also regional flights in Florida and Micronesia.