Airplane Crashes, Pilot | featured news

Pilots wrestled with the controls of an Air France airliner for more than four minutes before it plunged into the Atlantic with its nose up, killing all 228 people on board, French investigators said on Friday.

Federal officials say the pilot of a small airplane is dead after a crash in central Illinois. Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Tony Molinaro says the single engine home-built aircraft took off from the Decatur Airport on Thursday afternoon and crashed 1.5 miles east of the airport.

Federal investigators hammered Colgan Air executives about the pay of their pilots -- in 24-year-old Shaw's case, she made between $16,000 and $20,000 a year, according to testimony -- as well as whether they were discouraged from getting second jobs and felt pressure by the company not to call in sick.

Pilot fatigue also is being examined as a factor in the Flight 3407 crash.

Safety investigators were told the pilot in the worst U.S. air crash in more than seven years had trouble learning a critical ...

A US pilot avoids injury in a crash after his plane's fall is cushioned by a row of portable toilets.