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12 dead after skydiving plane crashes in Missouri, authorities say
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Emergency vehicles are parked outside the Butler Memorial Airport after a plane crash in Butler, Mo., on Sunday. Reed Hoffmann/AP hide caption toggle caption Reed Hoffmann/AP BUTLER, Mo. — A plane carrying a pilot and 11 passengers planning to spend a sunny afternoon skydiving crashed Sunday in Missouri, killing all aboard, authorities said. The Missouri State Highway Patrol said in a statement that troopers were at the crash site, assisting the Butler Police Department & Bates County Sheriff's Office. The crash occurred near the Butler Memorial Airport. The small town of Butler has a population of around 4,300 people and is roughly 65 miles south of Kansas City. Missouri Highway Patrol Sgt. Justin Ewing said the plane was taking people up to skydive. Emergency responders got a call that a plane was down and engulfed in flames around 11:30 a.m. Sunday, he said. "It landed in a field adjacent to the airport, but I think they're shutting down the roadway just as a precaution," Ewing said. A heap of blue and silver mangled metal lay in the grass near the airport with a massive line-up of emergency vehicles on the street beside it. Teams from the National Transportation Safety Board and Federal Aviation Administration were en route to the crash site Sunday afternoon to investigate, according to the Missouri State Patrol. The private plane was operated by Skydive Kansas City, said Dennis Jacobs, the acting airport manager and Bates County Emergency Management Agency director. "It had just taken off and made a left turn" before the crash, Jacobs said. "In my opinion I think it was losing power, and he was trying to make it over to the highway and land, and he stalled and went down nose first and caught fire." Emergency responders were able to put out the fire shortly after the crash, Jacobs said, calling the scene "brutal." First responders have checked the area under the flight path and did not find anyone who might have tried to jump out before the crash, Jacobs said. The Pacific Aerospace 750XL that crashed is a single engine turboprop plane model that's popular for skydiving but has also proven useful for other uses, including cargo, aerial surveying and medical evacuation flights. The aircraft can carry as many as 17 skydivers and is capable of taking off and landing on short runways. The plane that crashed Saturday was manufactured in 2010, according to FAA records. The small airport serves around 30 aircraft, all privately owned, including crop dusting companies and sky dive operators, Ewing said. Sky diving companies operate in the region eight or nine months a year, with the season usually starting in late March or early April and lasting into October or November. Someone answering the phone at Skydive Kansas City declined to speak to a reporter from The Associated Press. It's not yet known what factors may have contributed to the crash or caused it, Ewing said, and those details will be part of the investigation carried out by NTSB officials. Aviation safety expert Jeff Guzzetti said that poor maintenance has been a factor in a number of previous skydiving plane crashes because these companies are not held to a high standard under FAA rules. Guzzetti said skydiving companies are governed by the same rules any private plane owner has to follow and not the more stringent rules that charter flight operators and airlines adhere to. "There's been a whole history of skydiving accidents for inadequate maintenance and deficient safety culture," said Guzzetti, who used to be a crash investigator for both the NTSB and FAA.
Just nowFlora DruryEPAThe crash killed all but one person on board, and 19 more people on the groundThe investigation into the Air India crash which left 260 people dead is ongoing, with the final report to be "released upon [its] completion", India's Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) has said on the first anniversary of the disaster.The statement said "significant progress" had been made, in particular to "the examination and analysis of aircraft systems, flight recorder data, engine-related components, maintenance and operational records".But it did not give a date for the investigation's completion.The exact cause of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner crash shortly after taking off from Ahmedabad en route to London on 12 June 2025 has been the subject of widespread speculation.The plane came down about 6km (3.7 miles) away from the airport, crashing into a building used as doctors' accommodation at the Byramjee Jeejeebhoy Medical College and Civil Hospital, and causing an explosion. It left 19 people dead on the ground, as well as killing 241 on board. Of the passengers and crew killed, 169 were Indian nationals and 53 were Britons.One person survived - Viswashkumar Ramesh, from Leicester. Friday's update gives few extra details - instead simply saying the team "has undertaken an extensive and rigorous examination of all relevant technical, operational, organisational and human factors associated with the accident"."Every aspect of the accident will be examined with the utmost care and diligence," it adds.The statement, which extends its condolences to the "families and loved ones" of the deceased, also emphasises the fact the "sole purpose of an accident investigation is to enhance aviation safety through the identification of lessons and safety recommendations, and not to apportion blame or liability".An initial preliminary report was published on 12 July last year, finding that just seconds after take-off, fuel-control switches abruptly moved to the "cut-off" position, starving the engines of fuel and triggering total power loss.Audio recordings from the cockpit captured one pilot asking the other why he had done it, with the other replying that he had not. Investigators did not identify which pilot made either statement.In the days after its release, attention turned to the pilots. The Wall Street Journal and Reuters news agency reported that new details in the investigation were shifting attention towards the senior pilot in the cockpit - Capt Sumeet Sabharwal."A cockpit recording of dialogue between the two pilots of the Air India flight" that crashed last year supports the view that the "captain cut the flow of fuel to the plane's engines", the Reuters report said, citing unnamed sources.The media reports prompted a strong backlash from pilots' associations in India, which criticised the coverage and rejected suggestions that the senior pilot had caused the crash, as well as the AAIB."You see, every time an accident takes place, the pilot is blamed. Why? It's the simplest way to close the chapter. He is no more and cannot defend himself," Pushkar Raj, who is his 90s, said.
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