Five people were killed Sunday in the crash of a private jet as it prepared to land at an airport in western Virginia, according to state and federal authorities.
The twin-engine IAI Astra 1125 crashed near Ingalls Field Airport in Hot Springs, Va., around 3 p.m., the Federal Aviation Administration said.
It was “short on its approach to the runway, struck trees and then the hillside,” state police said.
The flight originated in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and carried a pilot, first officer and three passengers: a man, a woman and a boy, state police said.
The occupants were on their way to the airport to attend an event at the Homestead Resort, in Hot Springs, state police said, based on information from the attorney for the plane’s owner.
No survivors were found, police said. The names of those who died were withheld pending notification of relatives, authorities said.
The cause of the crash was not known, an investigator from the National Transportation Safety Board said Monday at a briefing. All possibilities would be considered, he said.
No emergency had been declared, investigator Adam Gerhardt said.
The crew apparently expressed an intention to land at the airport on an east-west runway, he said. However, he said the track of the flight was short by about a tenth of a mile, or 500 feet, and wreckage was found about two to three hundred feet from the runway.
Sunday was a windy day in much of the region. At the time of the crash, Gerhardt said, a wind of 19 knots was blowing from the west, with gusts to 38 knots. He said investigators would look into weather among other possible causes.
Bath County, where the airport is located, is on the border with West Virginia, in the central western part of Virginia. It is southwest of Harrisonburg, and about 175 miles southwest of Washington.
The IAI Astra is described online as a medium-range low-wing corporate jet, manufactured by Israel Aerospace Industries. The engines are mounted on the rear of the fuselage, on either side.