Search ends for plane that crashed into Lake Erie Dec. 29

CLEVELAND — The city has called off search and recovery efforts for the plane that went down over Lake Erie on Dec. 29.

Khlaid Bahhur, commissioner of Burke Lakefront Airport, announced the decision Tuesday.

“Due to conditions in the water, it is not likely that we will be able to recover additional human remains,” he said.

The city has maintained that recovering human remains was the primary goal of search efforts, and finding aircraft debris was secondary.

Boardman native John Fleming, president and CEO of Superior Beverage Group, was piloting the Cessna 525 Citation. Also on board were his wife Suzanne, their two teenaged sons, Jack and Andrew, and their neighbor Brian Casey and his 19-year-old daughter Megan.