Fiery U.S. Marine plane crash kills at least 16 people

Aircraft leaves trail of wreckage in Miss.

ITTA BENA, Miss. — A U.S. Marine refueling tanker crashed into a soybean field in rural Mississippi yesterday, killing at least 16 people aboard and spreading debris for miles.

“Most of them are gonna be Marines,” Sheriff Ricky Banks said. He could not confirm whether there were any civilians on the plane.

Leflore County Emergency Management Agency Director Frank Randle told reporters at a late briefing that 16 bodies had been recovered after the KC-130 spiraled into the ground about 85 miles north of Jackson in the Mississippi Delta.

Banks had said emergency crews were searching for bodies in surrounding fields until after nightfall, more than five hours after the KC-130 spiraled into the ground.

“We’re still searching the area,” Banks said earlier. “It’s hard to find bodies in the dark.”

Marine Corps spokeswoman Capt. Sarah Burns said in a statement that a Marine plane “experienced a mishap” last night but provided no details.

Andy Jones said he was working on his family’s catfish farm just before 4 p.m. when he heard a boom and looked up to see the plane corkscrewing downward with one engine smoking.

“You looked up and you saw the plane twirling around,” he said. “It was spinning down.”

Jones said the plane hit the ground behind some trees, and by the time he and others reached the crash site, fires were burning too intensely to approach the wreckage. The force of the crash nearly flattened the plane, Jones said.

“Beans are about waisthigh, and there wasn’t much sticking out above the beans,” he said.

Jones said a man borrowed his cellphone to report to authorities that there were bodies across U.S. Highway 82, more than a mile from the crash site.

Greenwood fire Chief Marcus Banks, no relation to the sheriff, told the Greenwood Commonwealth that debris from the plane was scattered in a radius of about 5 miles.

Jones said firefighters tried to put out the blaze at the main crash site, but withdrew after an explosion forced them back. The inferno produced towering plumes of black smoke visible for miles across the flat region and continued to burn after dusk, more than four hours after the crash.

Aerial pictures taken by WLBT-TV showed the skeleton of the plane burning strongly.

“It was one of the worst fires you can imagine,” Jones said. He said the fire was punctuated by the pops of small explosions.

Officials did not release information on what caused the crash or where the flight originated.

AP PHOTOS TRAGEDY: A military aircraft crashed in a remote part of Mississippi yesterday, leaving a plume of smoke, right, that could be seen for miles. Above, authorities arrive at the scene where at least 16 were killed.