Small plane crashes near Montana airport, 17 killed

Source: Xinhua | 03-23-2009 08:38

LOS ANGELES, March 22 (Xinhua) -- A small plane crashed Sunday afternoon near an airport in Montana, with 17 people including several children reportedly killed, U.S. authorities said.

Flames and billowing smoke rise after a single-engine private passenger plane crashed into a cemetery, on approach to an airport in Butte, Montana, killing 17 people, March 22, 2009. REUTERS

The sing-engine Pilatus PC12 plane crashed in a cemetery around 2:30 p.m. local time in Butte, about 100 kilometers south of Helena, state capital of Montana, according to a spokesman of the Federal Aviation Administration.

The leased plane, whose passengers included several young children, was en route to Butte for a ski vacation from California, officials said. It was unknown if anyone on the ground was injured in the crash.

According to the Montana Standard, eyewitnesses said that the plane was doing steep angle turns and then went into nose dive before crashing in Holy Cross Cemetery just south of the Bert Mooney Airport in Butte.

Investigators of the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board are on the way to the crash site, officials said.

Editor:Zhang Pengfei