National Guard identifies victims in Camden crash

Two Arkansas National Guardsmen killed Sunday

Two Arkansas National Guardsmen have been identified as the two victims in a plane crash Sunday at the Camden Municipal Airport.

The Arkansas National Guard on Tuesday identified the guardsmen killed in the crash as chief warrant officers Rufus Ferron Brown of Arkadelphia and Justin Levon Ashley of North Little Rock. The two were off-duty and not performing in a military capacity.

Both service members were pronounced dead on the scene by Ouachita County Coroner Sylvester Smith at 9 p.m. Sunday. Both men had blunt force trauma suffered in the plane crash.

The accident occurred shortly after 6:30 p.m. The plane had just taken off and appeared to turn back before hitting the ground and bursting into flames, authorities said.

The plane, a six-seat Beech-craft C35 V-Wing, taxied to the north end of the Harrell Field runway, took off heading south and suddenly made a U-turn as soon as its wheels left the ground, said Capt. Adam LaDuke of the Ouachita County sheriff’s office.

Justin Starnes of the Ouachita County Sheriff’s Department said the plane appeared to have a malfunction and made a turn back toward the south when “it made a nosedive and crashed.”

LaDuke said the plane was headed to Saline County Regional Airport in Bryant but had stopped in Camden to buy fuel because it was cheaper there. It’s a common practice among pilots to do that, LaDuke said.

LaDuke said he didn’t know where the plane flew in from.

Camden Fire Chief Rob Metford said firefighters were called to the airport at 6:52 p.m., and the craft was fully engulfed in flames when they arrived. Firefighters extinguished the blaze with foam and recovered the bodies of the two men, he said.

The airplane is registered to co-owners Rufus F. Brown of Hensley and Michael S. Felcher.

LaDuke said he spoke with Felcher on Monday morning after learning he

was not on the plane.

Metford said the plane crashed in grass just to the northeast of the runway. The burned wreckage was confined to a small area, he said, indicating the plane did not explode in the air. Some witnesses told authorities they heard an explosion when the plane crashed.

Willie Jean Kemp said she returned to her home on Carden Street at the northern end of the airport Sunday night and saw the smoldering wreckage of the airplane.

She said a friend who lives by her saw the crash and notified authorities.

“He said it was taking off and just got up when it turned around and tried to land,” Kemp said. “It took a nose dive and crashed.”

Angie Langley, an employee of Quickie’s Valero on U.S. 79, said she saw smoke on the northern end of the runway. The convenience store is near the airport.

“We assumed it was someone burning diesel off,” she said. “Then we saw the firetrucks.”

Police said the weather was clear at the time of the accident.

Lynn Lunsford, a spokesman for the Federal Aviation Administration, said investigators arrived at the crash site Monday morning and the National Transportation Safety Board is in charge of the investigation.

“It’s hard to figure out what happened,” LaDuke said. “It made that hard turn left to come back. You can assume it was mechanical failure, but right now all it is is assumptions.”