3 people killed in Hall County plane crash identified

Deputies say the bodies have transported to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation Crime Lab for autopsy.

From Friday Night:

Hall County investigators say three people are dead and a home was evacuated after a plane crash Friday night.

It happened shortly after 6 p.m. along Memorial Park Drive and Atlanta Highway near Gainesville.

Investigators told Channel 2′s Justin Wilfon that the plane was heading to Daytona Beach, Florida, from the Lee Gilmer Airport in Gainesville when something went wrong. The pilot tried to turn the plane around but couldn’t make it.

Late Friday night, the FAA released a statement on the crash.

“A single-engine Cessna 182 crashed about two miles northeast of the Lee Gilmer Memorial Airport in Gainesville, Ga., around 6:10 p.m. local time yesterday. Preliminary information indicates three people were aboard. Please check with local authorities for the names and conditions of the occupants. The aircraft crashed shortly after departing from Gainesville on a planned flight to Daytona Beach. The FAA will release the tail number of the aircraft after investigators verify it at the accident site. The FAA and National Transportation Safety Board will investigate. The NTSB will be in charge of the investigation and will provide additional updates. Neither agency identifies people involved in aircraft accidents.”

This plane crashed less than a mile from the airport near a neighborhood of mobile homes.

“It was just like a loud crash sound and I looked up and it was like a little white plane crashed down. It hit the tree. It looked like he was trying to land safely but it didn’t work out,” witness Dustin York said.

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“There is part of a wing that landed into a mobile home bedroom, a bedroom of that mobile home where 3 to 4 people were having dinner and some people had just left out of that room, so fortunately no one was injured in that trailer. There’s actually no injuries on the ground,” Gainesville fire division chief Keith Smith said.

Investigators have not released the identities of the three people on board, but we do know they were all adults.

Wilfon asked if the weather could have been a factor in this crash, the fire department said the rain had stopped at the time the plane went down but it was still very cloudy.

Investigators remained at the scene late Friday night working to remove the remains of the plane.

A nearby home also was evacuated because of fuel that fell in the area. The American Red Cross currently is helping four adults and a child with temporary housing.