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A small turboprop aircraft, loaded with hurricane relief supplies and en route to Jamaica, crashed into a pond within a residential area of Coral Springs, a suburb of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, authorities reported on Monday morning. The incident occurred just moments after the plane took off.
According to a fire official speaking with The Associated Press, rescue efforts did not uncover any victims, prompting the operation to transition into a recovery mission. The exact number of individuals aboard the aircraft at the time of the crash remains unclear.
Deputy Chief Mike Moser of the Coral Springs-Parkland Fire Department stated that emergency crews arrived swiftly following the crash report. While no houses suffered damage from the incident, responders identified some debris scattered near the retention pond.
Television footage captured from above revealed a broken fence in the backyard of a home adjacent to the pond, located near the crash site.
“There was no visible plane,” Moser explained. “The crews tracked the debris trail leading into the water.”
“We had divers that entered the water and tried to search for any victims and didn’t find any.”
Broward County, where the plane took off from and where the crash occurred, is home to a vibrant Caribbean American community that sprang into action to collect relief supplies following Hurricane Melissa. A powerful Category 5 hurricane, Melissa slammed into Jamaica late last month, leaving a path of destruction.
Moser said police would take over recovery efforts, and federal aviation officials would investigate the cause of the crash.
Coral Springs police didn’t immediately respond to calls and emails from AP.
The small Beechcraft King Air plane took off from the Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport at approximately 10.14am local time, according to a spokesperson for the City of Fort Lauderdale, which owns and operates the airport. The crash occurred soon after takeoff, with Coral Springs police officers and firefighters responding at 10.19 am, just five minutes later.
According to Federal Aviation Administration records, the plane was manufactured in 1976. King Air models can seat between seven and 12 people, according to the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association.
Federal records showed the registered owner of the plane is listed as International Air Services, a company that markets itself as specialising in providing trust agreements to non-U.S. citizens that enable them to register their aircraft with the FAA.
A person who answered the company’s phone on Monday afternoon declined to answer questions from a reporter, stating “no comment” and ending the phone call.
Hurricane Melissa made landfall in Jamaica on October 28, tied for the strongest landfalling Atlantic hurricane in history. The storm also caused devastation in Cuba, Haiti and the Dominican Republic and prompted relief organisations to mobilise.
Local government officials in Jamaica said in the days after the storm that Melissa had ripped the roofs off 120,000 structures, affecting some 90,000 families in the island’s especially hard-hit western region. A week after Melissa’s landfall in Jamaica, more than 2000 people were still reported to be in shelters.