Private Jet Grazes Turboprop on Approach to Van Nuys Airport

A private jet owned by actor Jim Carrey grazed a turboprop plane on approach to Van Nuys Airport on Tuesday, but both aircraft landed safely and no one was injured, the Federal Aviation Administration said.

Carrey wasn’t aboard his twin-engine Gulfstream 3 jet when it grazed a Beechcraft King Air C-90 shortly after 4 p.m., a spokeswoman said

“The situation is being handled through the proper channels and we are glad no one was injured,” Carrey’s publicist Marleah Leslie said.

The collision occurred south of Newhall Pass, a heavily traveled area for private aircraft, FAA spokesman Jerry Snyder said.

As the planes headed for the airport, Snyder said, it appears that the 21-seat Gulfstream struck the top of the other plane and punctured the Beechcraft’s left wing. The Gulfstream received minor damage.

Snyder could not say why both planes were flying so close.

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Both pilots had contacted the Van Nuys tower and had been cleared for landing, he said. But he noted that the Gulfstream pilot was on an instrument approach, while the Beechcraft pilot was flying under see-and-avoid visual flight rules.

“What you have to realize is that someone on visual is responsible for watching where he is,” Snyder said. “That’s not to say he is to blame.”

There were two passengers and a pilot aboard the nine-seat Beechcraft, Van Nuys Airport spokeswoman Charlene Klink said. Only three crew members were aboard Carrey’s plane, which was returning from Reno. The actor rents the jet for private charters and was in Los Angeles at the time of the incident, said David Bilson, president of Trans-Exec Air Service of Santa Monica, which manages the jet.

Bilson said Gulfstream pilot Mark Malone and co-pilot Bill Mnich were on descent when their craft struck the other plane.

“Our pilot was on instrument approach,” he said. “We were guaranteed to have that air space around us. We were descending, but I don’t think we overtook the other aircraft.”

The Beechcraft is registered to an owner in Scottsdale, Ariz., who couldn’t be reached for comment.

The Newhall Pass is a common way-point for aircraft heading north and south, and was the site of a midair collision in February that killed all four occupants of the two planes.