A federal investigator at the site of a fatal plane crash in South Dakota plans to focus on why the airplane was flying so low when it apparently hit the blade of a wind turbine.
The single-engine Piper crashed in foggy weather Sunday evening 10 miles south of the central South Dakota city of Highmore, killing the pilot and three cattlemen returning from a sale of live cattle and embryos.
Read: Piper 32 Plane Crashes into South Dakota Wind Farm
Possible factors include trouble with the pilot or plane and weather, said Jennifer Rodi, a National Transportation Safety Board investigator.
“Was the pilot having problems? Was it the weather? Was the airplane having problems?” Rodi said. “We haven’t ruled anything out at this point.”
It’s not known if the pilot filed a flight plan, she added. He was not communicating with air-traffic controllers at the time of the crash.
The pilot, Donald J. “D.J.” Fischer, 30, of Gettysburg, owned the plane. Also killed were cattlemen Brent Beitelspacher, 37, of Bowdle, and Logan Rau, 25, of Java, and Nick Reimann, 33, of Ree Heights.
Mike Mimms, a veterinarian who runs the annual sale in Hereford, said Reimann had been down for the show multiple times and is known across the industry as a master in livestock genetics.
“He was honestly the number one guy in this business and one that people trusted,” he said of Reimann. “He kind of a was a trendsetter that people wanted to know what he was doing and they tended to follow suit.”
The wreckage was found Monday at the South Dakota Wind Energy Center, a site south of Highmore with 27 turbines that are about 213 feet tall, plus the length of the blade.
The National Weather Service said fog and low clouds combined for reduced visibility in the Highmore area on Sunday night, and winds were out of the east at about 15 to 25 mph.
Rodi said the ultimate destination of the flight was Gettysburg, where the pilot lived, but he had picked up a passenger in Highmore on the way to Texas.
Highmore is less than 800 miles from Hereford, which falls within the maximum range of a Piper. However, factors such as how much fuel was in the plane when it left and what kind of head winds there were contribute to range, so that will also be part of the investigation, she said.
Rodi said that to her knowledge the plane did not stop to refuel, though that will be part of the investigation.
Filed Under: Aerospace + defense