NTSB confirms four dead in plane crash

An official with the National Transportation Safety Board said at a Monday afternoon press conference that four people were on the single-engine airplane that crashed Sunday in a Rockbridge County field near the Augusta County line, killing everyone onboard.

Tim Monville, senior air safety investigator said at the McCormick Farm that information is based on an FAA flight plan and airport personnel at the Teeterboro Airport in New Jersey.

Relatives of Daniel Joseph Dorsch, 56, and his wife, Cyndie, 55, released a statement today confirming the identities of two of those on the plane, saying, “We are deeply sadded by the loss of Mr. Daniel Joseph Dorsch and his wife, Cyndie Dimalanta Dorsch, who passed away in a plane crash yesterday.“

Dorsch was the former CEO of Checker’s Drive-In Restaurants, a Tampa-based chain of almost 800 drive-in restaurants. He was widely credited with turning around the chain, which was deeply in debt when he took over in 1999. He left Checker’s less than four years later.

The NTSB is working with a Virginia medical examiner to officially identify the passengers. State police said Sunday that everyone on the plane died in the accident.

According to Monville, the airplane left Teeterboro at 8:25 a.m. Sunday for a three hour and 58 minute flight to Tampa, Fla. The pilot made reference to a non-specific problem with a panel.

The plane was at 32,000 feet when radar and radio contact was lost. Monville described the impact as a steep vertical descent. The airplane fragmented on impact and there was a short post-crash fire, with an impact crater of about five feet deep, he said.

The largest piece of debris aside from the engine and propeller was the size of a garbage can, Monville said.

Monville said the airplane is so badly fragmented that they are looking for circuit boards on the ground to retrieve data from the plane. The fragments are some 300 yards out, with some of them in trees, he said.

Investigators are also looking at the plane’s maintenance records, any pilot concerns, such as medical problems, Monville said.

The crash happened in a Pilatus PC-12 on the McCormick Farm shortly after 10 a.m. The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the accident cause.

Public relations consultant Kim Francis offered the family statement this morning: “Mr. Dorsch was a strong leader, a respected entrepreneur, and a successful CEO who care deeply about his employees and his businesses. He and Cyndie Dorcsh are survived by their three sons: Jordan, Eliott, and Nicholas. They will be greatly missed.“