Plane crash near Dacus Lake Tuesday marks third crash in Mid-South within a week

A plane crash has left a Mississippi man dead Tuesday morning after falling near Dacus Lake on the edge of Shelby County, according to the Shelby County Sheriff's Office.

Malcolm King, a 62-year-old man from Hernando, Mississippi, was identified as the victim of the crash by SCSO. King was an instructor at Downtown Aviation, a flight school that operates out of the General Dewitt Spain Airport.

The plane, according to Memphis Shelby County Airport Authority public information officer Glen Thomas, took off from the tarmac at that same airport Tuesday morning.

The crash occurred east of the Mississippi River, on an area of land that falls narrowly within Shelby County jurisdiction, along the edge of Crittenden County. The sheriff's office will assist the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board in their investigations.

"SCSO is assisting the FAA and the NTSB In investigating a single-engine plane crash in farmland near the Shelby County and Crittenden County line," the sheriff's office tweeted.

The crash occurred just after 9 a.m., according to the sheriff's office.

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The plane is the third small plane to crash in the Mid-South within a week.

The first of those previous crashes took place Friday in Poinsett County, Arkansas saw the pilot survive while the second one, which took place Saturday in Lawrence County, Tennessee resulted in the death of the pilot.

Lucas Finton is a news reporter with The Commercial Appeal. He can be reached at Lucas.Finton@commercialappeal.com and followed on Twitter @LucasFinton.

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Dacus Lake plane crash leaves a 62-year-old man dead, police investigating