The two people killed when a small plane crashed on a Massachusetts highway were a married couple who appeared to take off without a flight plan — and without the aircraft’s owners knowing why it was being flown.
Thomas Perkins, 68, and his wife, Agatha Perkins, 66, of Middletown, Rhode Island, were found dead in the small Air Charity Network plane that crashed on I-195 in Dartmouth during rush hour Monday morning as wind gusts reached 55 mph, according to Boston 25 News.
An unidentified woman was hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries when her silver Hyundai Sonata was almost totaled in the crash.
“The plane may have been attempting to land at New Bedford Regional Airport, though it does not appear that the pilot provided the airport with a flight plan or the number of souls aboard the aircraft,” Massachusetts State Police said in a statement.
The pair were heading for Kenosha, Wisconsin, in a fixed-wing, single-engine plane registered to the Air Charity Network, the parent company of several regional “Angel Flight” charities that provide free air transportation for patients needing to get to specialized healthcare facilities, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
However, Air Charity Network’s regional partners in Massachusetts and Wisconsin said the downed plane was not linked with any scheduled flights for their organizations.
“We are all checking with each other to see which public benefit flying organization the pilot was volunteering for, and that has yet to be determined,” Brendan Sneegas, CEO and executive director of Angel Flight Central, told the Journal Sentinel.
The plane is owned by Easton Air LLC, according to FFA registration. Both Easton Air and Air Charity Network are based out of the Perkins’ hometown in Rhode Island.
Photos from the scene show the charred and mangled single-engine SOCATA TBM 700 surrounded by first responders in the grassy median of the highway.
State police said the plane burst into flames once it hit the ground.
The cause of the crash remains under investigation, but it occurred as a nasty fall storm pounded the northeastern US.
Due to the ongoing government shutdown, the Federal Aviation Administration was unable to provide additional details about the crash to media outlets, Boston 25 News reported.
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