Webb, NY -- State Police are assisting the Federal Aviation Administration and forest rangers with an investigation into the crash of a 2010 Jabira 4 airplane Thursday morning in northern Herkimer County.
A spokesman for the Vermont National Guard says the plane went down during close air support combat training for state guard units east of the Army's Fort Drum.
At approximately 8:30 a.m., a mayday was monitored by authorities indicating that the airplane, piloted by Benjamin P. Brown, age 34, of Southern Pines, North Carolina, was experiencing mechanical failure near Gull Lake in the Town of Webb. Two National Guard Blackhawk helicopters heard the mayday calls and picked up the downed crew members.
The aircraft was almost totally submerged in approximately 30 feet of water in Gull Lake. The pilot and his passenger, Charles E. Davis, age 44, of Cedar City, Utah were uninjured in the crash. It was reported that the aircraft had departed Burlington, Vermont earlier in the morning and was flying at an altitude of approximately 6,500 feet when the plane suffered a malfunction.
