A small turboprop plane on a hurricane relief mission to Jamaica crashed into a pond in a gated residential neighborhood of Coral Springs, Florida, killing two people shortly after takeoff. The aircraft narrowly missed homes, authorities and a local resident said.
The Coral Springs police department confirmed the deaths in a statement Monday afternoon but did not provide further details about the occupants. The Coral Springs-Parkland fire department deputy chief, Mike Moser, said emergency crews responded within minutes and shifted to a recovery operation after initially finding no victims. No homes were damaged, but debris was spotted near the retention pond.
Resident Kenneth DeTrolio told the South Florida Sun Sentinel that the plane crashed through his back yard, destroying his fence and toppling palm trees before hitting the water. He said debris was scattered across his yard and his pool and back porch were contaminated with spilled fuel. The fuel smell inside his home took hours to dissipate.
The small Beechcraft King Air plane took off from the Fort Lauderdale executive airport at approximately 10:14 a.m., with the crash reported at 10:19 a.m. According to Federal Aviation Administration records, the plane was manufactured in 1976 and registered to International Air Services, a company that declined to comment. The flight tracking website FlightAware showed the plane had made four other trips to or from Jamaica in the past week.
Hurricane Melissa, a Category 5 storm, slammed into Jamaica on October 28, causing widespread destruction. Local officials reported that the storm ripped roofs off 120,000 structures and affected about 90,000 families. More than 2,000 people remained in shelters a week after landfall. The relief mission was part of efforts by the Caribbean American community in Broward County to collect supplies for Jamaica.
