Cleveland calls off search and recovery effort in Lake Erie

Staff report

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 teenage sons, Jack and Andrew, and their neighbor Brian Casey and his 19-year-old daughter Megan.

Thoughout the search process, the Cuyahoga County medical examiner said crews recovered human remains of three of six individuals who were on board.

The city also has recovered more than 250 pieces of debris from the aircraft, including an engine, both wings and portions of the fuselage, tailpiece and cockpit.

Bahhur said the city will complete an accident report, which the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board will use to investigate what led to the crash.