A single engine fixed-wing Piper PA-28-181 has crashed in the brush on the eastern side of Block Island State Airport.
A small plane crashed just feet from the Block Island State Airport just after noon, today, Wednesday, July 30. The crash occurred at the end of Connecticut Avenue near the base of the hill leading up to the east end of the airport runway in a brush-filled area. Firefighters had to cut through a dense thicket of poison ivy and Japanese knotweed to get to the plane.
The plane landed upside down and the engine appears to have been pushed into the cockpit, making extraction of those inside difficult.
There were three people on board, two men and a woman and all were transported to the Block Island Health Center before being flown off the island.
One nearby resident on Connecticut Avenue said she heard a loud boom but did not realize a plane had crashed until first responders showed up at the scene. Although she did see a plume of smoke, the plane appears not to have caught fire.
Firefighters doused the area with flame retardant foam and had to cut their way through brush to get to the aircraft, which narrowly missed a truck parked just feet from where it landed. Assistant Fire Chief Kirk Littlefield told The Block Island Timesthe firefighters pushed the truck out of the way to get in close.
The plane was a single-engine, fixed-wing Piper PA-28-181 that is registered to CONDAIR Flyers, Inc., a not-for-profit flying club out of Latham, New York, in Albany County. It has 75 members that jointly own five aircraft, three Cessnas and two Pipers, according to its website.
