At least 1 person is dead in a fiery small plane crash in South Carolina beach resort

NORTH MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. — A single-engine plane carrying five people crashed Sunday near a golf course in the South Carolina coastal resort community of North Myrtle Beach, killing at least one person, police and federal officials said.

The Piper PA-32 went down northwest of the city’s Grand Stand Airport shortly after 11 a.m., the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement that confirmed five people were aboard.

North Myrtle Beach police spokesman Patrick Wilkinson said initially that there was at least one death and one other person taken to a hospital, the Myrtle Beach Sun News reported.

A North Myrtle Beach police dispatcher, contacted by The Associated Press, said she had no further information later Sunday and that no spokesperson was immediately available to provide further updates on the dead or injured.

The newspaper reported the plane went down in a fiery crash near a golf course in an area called Barefoot Landing, prompting police, fire and other emergency vehicles to rush to the site.

The paper quoted a visitor to the area, Iris Gaines, as saying she spotted the plane flying “sort of crazy like” with one of its wings higher than the other just before the crash. “It was so close over this condo,” she told the newspaper.

Wilkinson said the aircraft was fully engulfed in flames by the time emergency crews arrived, and the paper reported some trees appeared to be down along a road near the crash site.

The FAA said in a statement said the National Transportation Safety Board will lead an investigation into the crash. The FAA had no other information on where the plane departed from or where it was headed.