Who was flying the plane? Names released of people aboard Ohio jet that crashed in Florida
"We're not going to make the runway, we've lost both engines," the pilot of a twin-engine jet that took off from Columbus radioed just before crashing onto a busy Florida highway near Naples on Friday.
The pilot, Edward Daniel Murphy, 50, of Oakland Park, Florida and co-pilot Ian Frederick Hofmann, 65, of Pompano Beach, Florida both died in the crash, according to the Collier County Sheriff's Office in Florida. Survivors included crew member Sydney Ann Bosmans, 23, of Jupiter, Florida; and passengers Aaron Baker, 35, and Audra Green, 23, both of Columbus.
The 68-foot-long Bombardier Challenger 600 had five people on board when it took off from Ohio State University's airport at 12:30 p.m. Friday on its way to the Naples Airport. It was scheduled for a subsequent departure to Fort Lauderdale, said Robin King, director of communication with the Naples Airport Authority.
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The plane, which crashed onto southbound Interstate 75 at about 3:10 p.m, destroyed at least two vehicles in a fiery explosion, roughly 4.7 miles from the airport. Officials at Ohio State said the aircraft was not affiliated with the university.
Friday night, the Hop-a-Jet charter company released a statement saying it had "received confirmed reports of an accident involving one of our leased aircraft near Naples" and that it would dispatch a team to the crash site. The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating the incident.
"It was coming in for a landing," King said. "We received word that it had possibly lost an engine, we have not confirmed that, then we lost contact" just before the plane went down."
The Naples Airport Authority was unaware of who was on the crashed jet or why they were headed to southwest Florida, King said.
In a recording of the final radio communications with the aircraft, the pilot says: "OK, Challenger, Hop-A-Jet 823, lost both engines, emergency. I'm making an emergency landing."
The incident was at least the seventh fatal crash involving that series of Bombardier private jets since 2000, a Dispatch review of NTSB records found. Bombardier Inc., a private business jet manufacturer based in Montreal, Canada, could not be reached for comment.
The conditions of the three other people aboard the jet who were not killed remain unclear. Two ground vehicles were damaged in the crash: a 2015 Chevrolet Silverado and a 2023 Nissan Armada SUV.
The driver of the Silverado, a 48-year-old Naples man, suffered minor injuries and was taken to a local hospital, FHP said. The driver of the Nissan, a 66-year-old woman, and her two passengers, an 85-year-old woman and a 31-year-old woman, escaped with no injuries.
Witnesses to the crash described a chaotic scene.
"All of a sudden I saw a lot of black smoke," said Naples-area resident Jinny Johnson, who happened upon the crash just minutes after it took place. "It was pitch black. As I got closer, the smoke got a little lighter. And then I saw flames."
Read More: What happened? Flight tracker details doomed jet that took off in Ohio, crashed in Florida
Flames shot into the air, eating into the plane, and there was a damaged car sitting on the median, Johnson said. As she crept north, sticking to the curb lane on the far side of the road, she watched everything unfold.
Emergency vehicles had not yet arrived, and as traffic crept along, she watched a helicopter land near the wreckage. Ambulance, fire and police vehicles sped north up the sides of the interstate on the southbound side, she said. She thought it had hit a side wall along the highway, but wasn't sure.
Naples Airport dispatched firetrucks with a special foam-type substance that can help control jet fuel fires.
"Our immediate concern is for the well-being of our passengers, crew members, and their families," the company that leased the jet said.
Naples Daily News and Fort Myers News-Press journalists Liz Freeman, Kendall Little, Bill Smith, Andrew West, Stacey Henson, Dan Glaun and Alex Martin and Jim Wilhelm of the Columbus Dispatch contributed to this report.
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@ReporterBush
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Crew, passengers identified in jet that crashed on I-75 in Florida
