The pilot of an experimental plane that crashed on Independence Day near Buena Vista was heard making a mayday call over his radio before going down, according to a crash report released Monday.
The National Transportation Safety Board, in their preliminary findings on the crash, said, however, that the woman who heard the emergency declaration reported that the plane’s pilot did not elaborate on the problem he faced.
The pilot, 63-year-old Jay Jones from Buena Vista, died in the fiery crash. He was the only person aboard what the NTSB called an “amateur-built Seawind airplane.”
Witnesses told officials they heard the aircraft’s engine sputtering before the the plane went down in an open field.
The NTSB said Jones was heading from Lake County Airport in Leadville to Central Colorado Regional Airport in Buena Vista when the plane crashed. He was four miles from the Buena Vista airport.
Investigators say they were told Jones made a trip from Central Colorado Regional Airport to the Lake County Airport in the hours before the crash.
