[ad_1]
OROVILLE – The 10 people aboard a small jet escaped an injury Wednesday after the plane halted its takeoff at a small airport in northern California, left the runway and caught fire, have announced officials.
The pilot of the twin-engine Cessna Citation stopped his takeoff at the Oroville Municipal Airport for unknown reasons shortly before noon, said Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor.
The plane was carrying two pilots and eight passengers, and "all were found without injuries," said Joe Deal, chief of fire and police at Oroville.
The aircraft slipped from the end of the runway into the dry grass and caught fire. Officials briefly shut down Highway 162 nearby before controlling the grass fire to less than two acres.
The plane was flying from Oroville to Portland International Airport in Oregon, Gregor announced.
Deal said that it was a personal charter aircraft and that his business passengers had spent the night in Oroville.
"He was trying to take off, but early reports show that he has never managed to take off," said Deal. The jet slid from the north end of the runway onto a grassy area, but it never left the airport property. He was completely engulfed by the moment the firemen arrived.
Firefighters were able to quickly control the grass fire, but it took more than an hour to extinguish the jet, in part because it had just taken 400 gallons of jet fuel, did it? he declares. An accident truck from nearby Chico sprayed the jet of foam to help extinguish the fire.
The airport, which has no commercial flights, remained open.
The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board will investigate. It usually takes the NTSB a year or more to determine the probable cause of an accident, Gregor said.
[ad_2]
Source link