Commuter Plane, Private Aircraft Collide; 13 Killed

A commuter plane slammed into a private aircraft on an airport runway near Quincy, Ill., Tuesday night, exploding into a fireball and killing all 13 people aboard both aircraft.

A United Express turboprop with nine passengers and a crew of two was landing at Baldwin Municipal Airport when it collided with a smaller plane taxiing for takeoff with two occupants, aviation and emergency officials said. The two planes struck just after 5 p.m., said Toni Taylor, an officer with the Quincy Police Department. Skies were overcast at the time of the crash but visibility was 10 miles, authorities said.

Several passengers were taken by ambulances to area hospitals, but all were pronounced dead, authorities reported.

The crash occurred after the larger plane landed, said Ruth Zenning, a spokeswoman with United Airlines, which contracts with United Express to provide commuter connections. Witnesses said the smaller plane appeared to run into the United Express plane, which was just beginning to slow on its path down the runway.

A private pilot driving into the airport’s parking lot told Cable News Network that he watched both planes approach each other on the same runway. The smaller plane, the pilot said, apparently struck the larger one.

“I couldn’t believe it,” the unidentified pilot said. The smaller plane, he said, “just embedded itself” in the turbo prop.

The resulting explosion instantly engulfed both aircraft in flames, the pilot said. “I don’t think anything could be done at that point,” he said.

Firefighters from three local departments took an hour to bring the blaze under control, officials said.

Don Zochert, a spokesman with the Federal Aviation Administration, said the larger plane was a 19-seat Beechcraft 1900 registered to Bloomington, Minn.-based Great Lakes Aviation. It had flown into Quincy from Burlington, Iowa, Zenning said. Adams County sheriff’s officials tentatively identified the other plane as a King Aire 200 from the St. Louis area.

FAA officials said a team from the National Transportation Safety Board was en route from Washington to investigate the crash.

Air traffic at the Quincy airport, 10 miles from the Mississippi River and about 100 miles northwest of St. Louis, depends on visual landings and takeoffs. The airport has a control tower but it is obsolete and has not been used for some time.

The airport became a crucial lifeline to the Quincy area in 1993, when a historic flood on the Mississippi cut traffic across all area bridges between Illinois and Missouri.

Last August, a skydiver fell to his death at the Quincy airport during the World Free Fall Convention. It was the fifth death in the 11-year history of the world’s biggest skydiving festival.