TIFTON — A former Tifton resident and his brother were killed Tuesday when a private plane crashed shortly after takeoff from Huntsville International Airport.

Steven Patrick Hogan, 40, of Madison, Ala., formerly of Tifton, and his brother, David Craig Hogan, 42, of Huntsville, Ala., died when the six-seat, single-engine Cessna T206H went down in a wooded, swampy area at 6:17 p.m.

According to The Huntsville Times, the Federal Aviation Administration reported that the accident happened just after takeoff.

The National Transportation Safety Board completed their examination of the plane but haven’t announced what caused the crash. The NTSB had planned a helicopter airlift of the plane’s wreckage for Wednesday. It remains unclear who was piloting the plane.

Storms had passed through the area Tuesday night around the same time as the crash.

According to reports, the plane left the airport’s east runway and headed south before making an immediate left toward its intended destination of Fulton County Airport just outside of Atlanta.

The plane was rented through Huntsville Flight Center. Dr. Jonathan Denton of Decatur, an owner of the plane, told the Decatur Daily Wednesday that his wife had flown the same airplane Tuesday morning and it was “airworthy.”

An air safety investigator with the Federal Aviation Administration said that a full report could take from six months to a year.

Steven Hogan is survived by two daughters, Julie Ann and Mary Virginia of Tifton, and his wife Stephanie and their infant daughter, Sophia. Craig Hogan is survived by his wife, Ann, and their son Tyler.



To contact city editor Angie Thompson, call 382-4321, ext. 209.