The names of the three men killed in a plane crash in Baldwin have been released. Habersham County Deputy Coroner Kenneth Franklin says all three were from Florida.
The pilot is identified as 58-year old James Lycett of Port St. Lucie. Also killed in the crash were Lycett’s employee, 48-year old Steven Wisor of Fort Pierce and Wisor’s cousin, 45-year old Edward Black, of Port St. Lucie.
Franklin says it appears all three died on impact. Autopsies will be performed at the GBI State Crime Lab in Decatur.
Two dogs were also killed in the crash. One was owned by the pilot, the other by his girlfriend.
Franklin says Lycett owned a summer home in Clarkesville and “they came up occasionally and stayed here.”
The cause of the crash is under investigation. National Transportation Safety Board Investigator Eric Alleyne says the three were onboard a Piper PA-28 single-engine plane enroute to Habersham County from Fort Pierce when it crashed shortly after midnight Thursday. The plane went down in a wooded area inside the heavily populated Meadow Brook mobile home park on Clay Haven, less than half a mile from the Habersham County Airport.
Investigators spent the day Thursday combing through the wreckage. The recovered engine appeared to be mostly intact but the rest of the plane was destroyed.
Alleyne says investigators are looking into the pilot’s certification, plane maintenance records and weather as part of their investigation to determine what caused the crash. “From what I understand with the witnesses it was very foggy at the time,” he says. “A lot of the witnesses reported hearing the aircraft at the time and then they heard a loud ‘boom.'”
The wreckage was moved to an air salvage yard in Griffin, GA for further examination.
Celita Crane lives near the crash site. She’s one of the many witnesses who said they heard a loud noise around the time of the plane crash shortly after midnight Thursday.
Alleyne says he expects to release a preliminary report on the crash within five days.
Updated Nov. 5, 2015@7:18pm
