911 calls released after deadly plane crash in St. Simons Island

ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. – Calls made to 911 on the day of a deadly plane crash in St. Simons Island were released Friday, depicting a scary scene for many people in the area.

The pilot who died in the crash Saturday was identified as Roger Crane, 80, of Bluffton, South Carolina. The plane crashed in a wooded area on the north end of St. Simons Island in a wooded area off Lawrence Road.

Caller: "I'm not sure what happened, but the plane was flying over, then a boom, and now we see smoke coming out from the woods."

Dispatch: "OK, we're getting people over there now."

Another person called 911, saying he saw the plane dive.

Caller: "Some kind of small aircraft. My dad saw it and I was trying to find it. I could hear it. We were in a boat back here in the creek. There is a lot of smoke coming up. The reason we started looking if because the RPMs (were) real high, and it was pretty much just going straight down."

Dispatch: "You said it was going straight down? In like a nose dive?"

Caller: "He said yeah."

PREVIOUS STORY: Pilot killed in plane crash on St. Simons Island identified by police

The National Transportation Safety Board also released its preliminary report on the crash, which revealed at 9:19 a.m., the single-engine Cessna 182 was cleared for the visual approach to a runway at McKinnon St. Simons Island Airport. Radar lost contact with the plane at 9:23 a.m., when the airplane was five miles northeast of the airport.

According to the report, the pilot held a commercial pilot certificate and a flight instructor certificate. The pilot reported 4,600 hours of total flight experience on March 1, 2017.