Investigators search for clues in fatal Brookings plane crash

BROOKINGS, Ore. — Two people lost their lives when the plane they were in crashed just shy of the Brookings airport.

It happened just after 4 pm on Thursday afternoon.

Sheriff John Ward of the Curry County Sheriff’s Office says multiple agencies responded and helicopters searched from the skies.

He says the plane went down just a mile north of the Brookings airport.

Later that afternoon, Sheriff Ward says they located the plane by air and ground search crews.

Unfortunately, both the passenger and the pilot did not survive.

NTSB and FAA investigators are now in charge of the investigation. Friday, they say they’re at the crash site just trying to piece together what happened.

“There may have been a problem with the airplane, there could have been a physiological problem with the pilot, the weather might have been bad. Those are just some basic, general types of things we start looking at and then… we go from there,” said Thomas Little, air safety investigator for NTSB.

Little says investigations like these typically take around 6 months to a year.

He says the plane was also “experimental” meaning a pilot or someone else constructed it themselves.

The names of the two who died are not being released until the investigation is over, but we are told they were both from Del Norte County, California.

Stay with NBC5 News for updates on this developing story.

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