A single-engine plane crashed in Tennessee Saturday morning, killing three people on board, officials said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Mooney M20TN crashed south of the Upper Cumberland Regional Airport in Sparta, according to a statement from the Federal Aviation Administration<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Upper Cumberland Regional Airport Director Dean Selby said the airport heard reports of an aircraft going down at approximately 11:50 a.m. Shortly after, the Memphis Air Traffic Control Center called the airport to say it had lost communication and contact with an aircraft.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The plane departed from Alabama and was on its descent into the airport when it crashed, Selby said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Emergency management and fire and rescue workers, along with volunteers, looked for the crash site and were able to find it after the airport sent a plane up to search from the air, the director said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Selby described the area where the plane was found as “remote.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Federal Aviation Administration, which said it is investigating, arrived on-site a few hours after the crash, Selby said. The National Transportation Safety Board,\u00a0which is leading the investigation<\/a>, will arrive Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Selby said the airport is not releasing any of the victims\u2019 identities until next of kin are notified.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sparta is about 96 miles southeast of Nashville.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A number of small planes have gone down in recent weeks, each time killing all the passengers on board.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last month, a plane crashed into a home<\/a> Brooklyn Park, Minnesota. About two weeks later, another went down in upstate New York<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Three were killed when a plane crashed into a river in Nebraska<\/a> last Saturday, and four more died Sunday when a single-engine aircraft crashed in Illinois<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n