by: David Baxley

UPDATE (WDHN) –  Officials with the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board have taken over the investigation into Saturday evening’s crash of a small plane in Elba.

On Sunday, the Elba Fire Department confirmed two people were aboard the plane when it went down in a heavily-wooded area, near Elba’s Carl Folsom Airport, Saturday evening around 8:15 p.m.

One of the people onboard, an instructor pilot, managed to call 9-1-1 to provide an approximate location of where the plane went down. Numerous trucks and engines from Elba Fire and units from Elba Police were dispatched to the scene.  Soon after, deputies from the Coffee County Sheriff’s Office, troopers from the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency, members of Enterprise Rescue and fire personnel from New Brockton also arrived to aid in the operation.

Meanwhile, Dale County’s Sheriff’s helicopter and Fort Rucker’s rescue helicopter were dispatched and helped locate the crash site from above.

“With the help of air units over head directing them, they removed the patients from the crash site out to the airport to awaiting ambulances where they were determined to be relatively uninjured,” a Facebook post from the Elba Fire Department said.

After both people were removed from the aircraft, fire officials returned to the crash site to “fully secure the aircraft and obtain information.”

“The FAA and NTSB were contacted and the scene was turned over to their agencies, ” the post said.

ORIGINAL STORY

COFFEE COUNTY, Ala. (WDHN)  —  Coffee County Sheriff David Sutton confirms to WDHN News a small plane crashed in Elba Saturday evening.

The plane was reported down shortly after 8 p.m. Numerous first responders from Elba and Coffee County went to the scene along with troopers from the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency.

The small plane went down in a wooded area near Elba’s Carl Folsom Airport.

Sheriff Sutton confirmed the people on board the plane were not injured.

The Elba Police Department is the lead agency handling the situation, according to Sutton.