Private jets crash on ground at airport, killing 1 person
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — One person was killed and others were injured when a private jet owned by Mötley Crüe singer Vince Neil hit another jet Monday afternoon at the Scottsdale Airport in Arizona, authorities said.
Neil’s jet was landing at the airport when it veered off the runway and struck a parked plane, Neil’s representative Worrick Robinson IV said in a statement.
There were two pilots and two passengers on Neil’s plane, but he was not among them.
“Mr. Neil’s thoughts and prayers go out to everyone involved, and he is grateful for the critical aid of all first responders assisting today,” Robinson said.
The arriving jet veered off the runway and hit the Gulfstream 200 jet that was parked on private property, according to Kelli Kuester, aviation planning and outreach coordinator at the Scottsdale Airport. It appeared that the left main landing gear of the arriving jet failed, resulting in the crash, she said.
Kuester said four people were on the arriving jet, which had come from Austin, Texas, and one person was in the parked plane.
Two injured people were taken to trauma centers, and one was in stable condition at a hospital, Scottsdale Fire Department Capt. Dave Folio said.
“Our thoughts and prayers go out to everybody involved in this,” Folio said.
The Scottsdale on-ground crash comes after three major U.S. aviation disasters in the past two weeks. A commercial jetliner and an Army helicopter collided near the nation’s capital on Jan. 29, killing 67 people. A medical transportation plane crashed in Philadelphia on Jan. 31, killing the six people on board and another person on the ground.
And last week a commuter plane crashed in western Alaska on its way to Nome, killing all 10 people on board.