Plane with unresponsive pilot crashes off Jamaica

Associated Press

KINGSTON, JAMAICA

Shadowed by two U.S. fighter jets, a small plane with its windows frosted and its pilot slumped over flew a ghostly 1,700-mile journey down the Atlantic Coast and beyond Friday before finally crashing in the waters off Jamaica. The fate of the two or more people aboard was not immediately known.

Maj. Basil Jarrett of the Jamaican Defense Force said the plane went down about 14 miles from the coastal town of Port Antonio and the military dispatched two aircraft and a dive team.

“An oil slick indicating where the aircraft may have gone down has been spotted in the area where we suspect the crash took place,” Jarrett said at an evening news conference in the capital of Kingston.

No wreckage has been located, but Jarrett said search-and-rescue teams were scouring the waters for any survivors.

As night fell, Jamaica Coast Guard Commander Antonette Wemyss-Gorman said search operations would be suspended and resumed at first light today. A U.S. Coast Guard cutter was to arrive in the area late Friday and join the search at first light, said Petty Officer Sabrina Laberdesque.