Air safety seminar set after spate of LI small plane crashes
A single-engine ultralight plane went down in a wooded area in Mastic on Sunday, July 16, 2017. The pilot, a Massapequa man, was not hurt, Suffolk County police said. Credit: LiHotShots / T.J. Lambui
Federal officials said Wednesday that they will hold a safety seminar in Ronkonkoma next month after a series of crashes on Long Island involving small planes in recent years.
The National Transportation Safety Board said the seminar would be held Sept. 9 at 8:30 a.m. at Mid-Island Air Service on Hering Drive in Ronkonkoma.
Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), who pressed for federal involvement, said the seminar would be the first of its kind on Long Island and would help local pilots learn about the causes of crashes and how to prevent them.
“These seminars are well attended, make the skies safer, and even allow pilots educational credits they can use to lower their insurance costs,” Schumer said.
The NTSB in March said that it examined 156 aviation accidents in the state over the past five years at Schumer’s request.
The review found that nothing set those accidents apart from those in general aviation, the agency said.
“For those accident investigations that have been completed, the causes have been similar to the cause of general aviation accidents that we investigated overall,” the agency said in a letter to Schumer on March 23.
About one-third of the crashes — including a cluster of seven early last year on Long Island — were caused by loss of pilot control, the agency said.
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Newsday Live: A chat with Joan Baez Join Newsday Entertainment Writer Rafer Guzmán and Long Island LitFest for an in-depth discussion with Grammy-winning singer, songwriter and social activist Joan Baez about her new autobiographical poetry book, "When You See My Mother, Ask Her to Dance."