MIAMI VALLEY — Two pilots from Ohio — including one from the Miami Valley — died during a plane crash in St. Charles County, Missouri.
Amanda Youngblood from Huber Heights and George King of Westerville died Saturday, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.
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The NTSB said the two were flying to Denver to pick up cargo when the plane crashed about nine minutes after taking off.
Investigators are working to find out what caused the plane to go down after it reached 8,000 feet.
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The pilots did not make a distress call before the crash, according to investigators, but they are looking into communications that may have indicated a problem with the flight.
Youngblood was a flight instructor at Dayton Aviation Services, based at the Moraine Airpark.
“Amanda was an amazing person who loved all of her family and friends deeply,” Dayton Aviation Services said in a Facebook post. “She was a beloved (flight) instructor here and will be incredibly missed. Amanda was a wonderful mom, friend, and pilot who always knew how to light up a room with her adventurous spirit.”
One of Youngblood’s friends told News Center 7 about the kind of pilot and person she will remember.
Sophia Lucas had been friends with Youngblood for a few years.
“It’s a huge loss for everyone that knew her, she was just an amazing person that cared so deeply,” Lucas said.
The two worked together when Youngblood was a flight instructor at Dayton Aviation Services.
“She was one of our best flight instructors, a huge, important part of the team,” Lucas said.
Lucas said Youngblood brought so much enthusiasm to everything she did, including being a mom to her three boys.
“I know she’s very proud of them, and she just wanted to be the best she could for them,” Lucas said.
There’s a saying in the aviation community. “They’ve flown west and we’ll see them again someday.”
“It’s something that we just all kind of gather around, they’ve flown west, they’ve gone out of our reach, but they’re still flying wherever they may be,” Lucas said.
As Youngblood’s family and friends mourn her loss, the NTSB is still working on its investigation into the crash to try and figure out how it happened.
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