UPDATE: Two killed after cargo plane goes off runway at West Virginia airport
by The Associated Press
The pilot and co-pilot died when the plane crashed at the Yeager Airport Friday morning
CHARLESTON, W.Va.—An airport official says two people have been killed after a cargo plane contracted by UPS went off the runway and over a hillside at a West Virginia airport.
Yeager Airport spokesman Mike Plante says the pilot and co-pilot died in Friday morning’s crash.
Plante says the Air Cargo Carriers plane arrived in Charleston, West Virginia from Louisville, Kentucky, at 5:43 a.m. and was trying to land when it went off the runway and down a steep, wooded hillside.
“It’s difficult terrain to negotiate,” Plante said.
The spokesman also noted that the weather in Charleston was sunny and clear.
The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating.
Airport officials have proposed spending $290 million to rebuild and extend the runway after a landslide in 2015 took out a church and an unoccupied house. The proposal calls for lengthening the runway from about 6,800 feet to 8,000 feet.
