Skip to footer

Taunton plane crash victims indentified

Taunton plane crash: The pilot and his passenger died when his 1946 Aeronca Champ crashed in Taunton, Mass. Sunday. Investigators are probing the cause of the plane crash.

  • By Staff Associated Press

 Officials have tentatively identified two men killed in a small plane crash at a municipal airport in southeastern Massachusetts.

The Bristol County District Attorney's office says 69-year-old John Schmouth, of Brockton, and 61-year-old Roland Deslauriers, of Bridgewater, are believed to have been on board when the plane crashed Sunday morning at Taunton Municipal Airport. Schmouth was listed as the pilot.

A spokesman for the prosecutor's office says family members have been notified but the identifications won't be confirmed until autopsies are complete.

Authorities say the small plane crashed during takeoff shortly after 6 a.m. An eyewitness said that the plane was attempting to take off when it went down.

Boston.com reports that "Keith Holloway, a spokesman for the National Transportation Safety Board, said the plane was an Aeronca 7AC, a type of small plane introduced in 1945 that has a front propeller and a wide, continuous wing over the fuselage. Holloway said the plane that crashed was built in 1946 but only recently purchased by the owner. He said investigators would inspect maintenance records for the aircraft, examine the wreckage for evidence of mechanical issues, and seek radar data that might show its trajectory.
James Madigan, a commissioner with the Taunton Municipal Airport Commission, said he arrived at the scene around 6:30 a.m., shortly after the crash, and found the Taunton Fire Department extinguishing flames."

The plane was attempting to take off when it went down near Westcoat Drive, the roadway leading to the airport, according to authorities. No one on the ground was injured.

Keith Holloway, a spokesman for the National Transportation Safety Board, said the plane was an Aeronca 7AC, a type of small plane introduced in 1945 that has a front propeller and a wide, continuous wing over the fuselage. Holloway said the plane that crashed was built in 1946cq but only recently purchased by the owner. He said investigators would inspect maintenance records for the aircraft, examine the wreckage for evidence of mechanical issues, and seek radar data that might show its trajectory.

James Madigan, a commissioner with the Taunton Municipal Airport Commission, said he arrived at the scene around 6:30 a.m., shortly after the crash, and found the Taunton Fire Department extinguishing flames.

- See more at: http://www.boston.com/metrodesk/2013/08/25/two-killed-this-morning-taunton-plane-crash/7oNGU0XNdldU3ZNVtoOvXN/story.html#sthash.Hz4fHmhz.dpuf

The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating along with state and local officials.

Taunton is about 40 miles south of Boston.

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Taunton plane crash victims indentified
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Latest-News-Wires/2013/0826/Taunton-plane-crash-victims-indentified
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe