Two people were killed after a small plane crashed Monday into a lake in a residential area outside of Miami, according to police.
The Beechcraft King Air plane departed from Fort Lauderdale at 10:14 a.m. E.T. headed toward Jamaica as part of relief efforts in the aftermath of Hurricane Melissa, according to a spokesperson for the Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport. The spokesperson could not provide NBC News with information regarding those on board the aircraft.
The aircraft went down in Coral Springs, apparently damaging part of a home’s backyard fence before crashing into a small lake, NBC South Florida reported. Officials said no one on the ground appeared to be injured by the crash.
Hours after the crash, the Coral Springs Police confirmed that two people were killed in the crash. The deceased were not identified.
Coral Springs Deputy Fire Chief Mike Moser said he did not know how many people were aboard the plane when it crashed.
Police and fire officials were at the scene with divers in an attempt to find survivors earlier in the day, but could not find anyone, according to Moser. He added that teams would shift to a "recovery effort."
"We have not found an entire plane yet. We believe that it may be broken into smaller pieces," Moser said. "We don’t know yet, of course — again, this is very preliminary."
Moser said that officials are working with the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board.
David Ubegi told NBC South Florida that he heard an explosion and ran out to see what happened when they saw water rising up.
"We saw all the parts of the plane and some body parts along sides of the houses, and when the police arrived we helped them look for the body parts," Ubegi said.
