Montana Plane Crash: Details Revealed

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• Description : The National Transportation Safety ...(more)Board has held a press briefing on its investigation into Sunday's plane crash in Butte, Montana. NTSB Acting Chairman Mark V. Rosenker conducted the briefing which took place at Bert Mooney Airport. A plane that crashed into a cemetery in Montana killing 14 people, half of them children, was overloaded, officials have said. The single engine turboprop aircraft should not carry more than 11 people - two in the cockpit and nine passengers - the National Transport Safety Board said. But on the journey from Oroville, California, to Bozeman, Montana, too many people were on board. At some point, the plane made a detour to Butte, where it crashed into the Holy Cross cemetery, about 500 feet (150 metres) short of the runway at Bert Mooney airport. The father of one of the families on a private airplane was piloting when the flight crashed into a cemetery, killing all 14 people on board, federal investigators said Monday. Investigators have not named the victims. St. Helena Hospital in St. Helena, California, said an ophthalmologist who worked there was killed, along with his family. "The St. Helena Hospital family is filled with such deep sadness over the deaths of Dr. Erin Jacobson, his wife Amy, and their three children, Taylor, Ava and Jude," the hospital said in a written statement, adding, "Our thoughts and prayers are with the families and friends of each victim of this terrible tragedy." The Napa Valley Register reported that the Jacobson children were 4, 3, and 2 years of age. Seven adults and seven children were on the plane traveling for a ski vacation, investigators said. They did not say who was piloting the aircraft, only that it was the father of one of the families on board. Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board arrived in Butte early Monday to investigate. But with no flight data recorder or cockpit voice recorder on the plane and no survivors, "this is going to take awhile," NTSB Acting Chairman Mark Rosenker said at a news conference. He said the investigation could last more than a few months. There is no requirement for a cockpit voice recorder or a flight data recorder on such private planes, he said. At the crash site, Holy Cross Cemetery, a CNN crew could see no large chunks of the plane, a single-engine Pilatus PC-12. But Rosenker said that "portions of all major structural components" had been identified. Some visitors set up crosses outside the gates of the cemetery, serving as a makeshift memorial. Others brought flowers. The flight was headed to Bozeman, Montana, but was rerouted to Butte instead, said FAA spokesman Mike Fergus. The plane crashed 500 feet short of the runway at Bert Mooney Airport. No one on the ground was injured, Sheriff John Walsh said. The weather, which was clear Sunday, does not appear to have been a factor. The plane was designed to carry 11 people -- two in the cockpit and nine in the cabin, said Rosenker. He noted that young children often travel on the laps of adult passengers. Rosenker said that although the plane had no voice or data recorders, there might be some avionics -- electronic systems that private planes can use for a variety of purposes -- that might contain some information, though they are not built to withstand crashes. Witness Martha Guidoni told CNN that she and her husband saw the plane crash. She photographed one of the first images from the scene, which showed the cemetery in the foreground of a huge blaze. "We were just taking a ride -- all of a sudden, we watched this plane just take a nosedive," she told CNN. "We drove into the cemetery to see if there was any way my husband could help someone. We were too late -- there was nothing to help." Her husband, Steve Guidoni, said the plane "went into the ground" and the flames set a tree on fire. "I looked to see if there was anybody I could pull out, but there wasn't anything there, I couldn't see anything," he told CNN. "There was some luggage strewn around. ... There was some plane parts." A flight plan said the plane originated in Redlands, California, according to flight-tracking site FBOweb.com. Stops were made in Vacaville and Oroville, California, before the plane headed for Montana. The plane stopped at the Oroville airport about 11 a.m., refueled, and departed about half an hour later, said Police Chief Kirk Trostle. The Oroville airport is "uncontrolled," meaning it does not have a control tower. Eric Teitelman, Oroville's director of community development and public works, said that because it has a "wide-open runway" and a self-service fuel system, it is a frequent stop for general aviation aircraft. There were conflicting reports about ownership of the plane, manufactured in 2001. (less)