Blewett Falls Lake, NC Transport Crashes Into Lake, Apr 1992

C-130 CRASH KILLS 9.

WRECKAGE BURIED IN CAROLINA LAKE.

Lilesville, N.C. (AP) -- An Air Force C-130 transport plane plunged into a lake on a training mission, killing all nine people aboard, in the second fatal crash in three months of the military's workhorse aircraft.
A diver pulled one body from the sunken wreckage before the search was suspended because of darkness, the Sheriff's Department said. This morning, two small boats circled the wreckage as divers prepared to resume the search.
Witnesses said the plane circled Blewett Falls Lake for about 15 minutes before rolling over and plunging into the water sideways Tuesday night, Sheriff Tommy Allen said. The weather was cloudy but calm.
"The plane has broken up into several pieces," Allen said. "Some of it's buried in the mud. The tail section is sticking up out of the river. That's the only part of the plane that you can see."
All nine crew members were killed, said Tech. Sgt. Edward Drohan, spokesman at Pope Air Force Base near Fayetteville, where the plane was based.
The crewmen were:
GABRIEL MAGRANE.
THOMAS E. ROWE.
MICHAEL E. JONES.
JOHN G. URBANSKY.
GREGG F. JOHNSTON.
STEPHEN F. SABLONE.
MICHAEL S. CARPENTER.
SHENTON M. CLARK.
MARK W. REYNOLDS (Australian Exchange Officer).
The cause of the crash was not immediately known, Drohan said.
In Tuesday's accident, a fuel spill in the lake delayed efforts to send divers in. Crews used absorbent materials to sop up the fuel from the aircraft, which was submerged in 20 feet of water.
The plane went down in southcentral North Carolina, about 50 miles southeast of Charlotte and 40 miles from the air base. Blewett Falls Lake is created by a dam along the Pee Dee River.

Kokomo Tribune Indiana 1992-04-29
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Researched and Transcribed by Stu Beitler. Thank you, Stu!