Young Pilot Dead After Plummeting 3,500 Feet From Faulty Plane

A young pilot has been confirmed dead after he reportedly fell 3,500 feet from a faulty plane without a parachute in Fuquay-Varina, North Carolina on Friday, July 29.

The man identified as Charles Hew Crooks, 23, was found dead in the backyard of a home about 30 miles south of the airport in the town of Fuquay-Varina after a small plane, a CASA C-212 Aviocar made in Spain in 1983, made an emergency landing at Raleigh Durham International Airport on Friday, July 29. Crooks did not have a parachute on and authorities believe his body fell about 3,500 feet, New York Post reported.

A twin-engine cargo plane had to make an emergency landing after it was unable to open its right landing gear. However, the plane's left landing gear appeared to be working properly.

"We had officers that were responding in the area for the search and were flagged down by a resident. They had heard something in their backyard which led to us finding this individual," Wake County Emergency Management Chief of Operations Darshan Patel said.

“I believe this was a first for many of us that were working this incident today,” Patel said of the death.

Both the Federal Aviation Authority and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating the incident.

Meanwhile, Crooks’ co-pilot, whose name has not been released, was taken to a hospital after sustaining minor injuries, 6ABC Action News reported.

“We can’t process it right now, I don’t know,” the victim’s father, Hew Crooks, said.

“He pursued his private pilot license while he was in college. I think he got that when he was a sophomore,” Hew Crooks said. “He said a couple of weeks ago, he wouldn’t trade places with anybody in the world. He loved where he was.”

“I can’t imagine what happened,” the dad said. “We’ll figure it out, I suppose.”

Meanwhile, the co-pilot who survived the attack said that another passenger aboard jumped out before the landing attempt and was initially thought to have exited the plane toward a body of water.

"We have a very large search area," Patel said.

"At this time, what we know is that the passenger was wearing tan pants and a logo-branded shirt," he continued.