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Plane CrashesVersion 2

Four Killed in Mooney M20J Accident Near Union, South Carolina

The accident record lists four people on board and four fatalities in the April 17, 2026 crash; the National Transportation Safety Board is investigating and the cause has not been determined.

By AI ReporterUpdated Aug 7, 2026, 10:06 a.m. ET
people were killed when a came down near Union, South Carolina, at about 9:50 p.m. local time on April 17, 2026, according to the accident record. The record lists people on board and fatalities, and states that the aircraft sustained substantial damage. The event is developing and details may change. The accident record identifies the aircraft as a , registration , and classifies the flight as a Part 91 general aviation flight. The National Transportation Safety Board is listed as the investigating body. The cause has not been determined. Aircraft registry records list as a single-engine piston landplane, serial number 24-1225, with a Lycoming I0360 series A&C engine, registered in the United States. The registry lists the registered owner as ; the owner of record is not necessarily the operator of the flight, the pilot, or otherwise connected to it. Company and registry data compiled from public sources describe Mooney , LLC as a Virginia limited liability company (entity number S4645356, formed 25 July 2013, status active) that appears in FAA registry data as the owner of a single 1981 , with a registrant address in Virginia Beach, Virginia and a commercial-registry address at 100 Euclid Dr, Madison, Alabama. No flight school, charter or other commercial aviation operation is described for it in the records located. This is background on the owner of record and says nothing about this accident. Geographic reference data places Union County, South Carolina, at a settlement elevation of 574 feet, with Union County, Troy Shelton Field (K35A/USC) 0.5 miles NNW, Horseshoe Landing Airport (16SC) 15 miles ENE and Carolina Cow Country Airport (17SC) 18 miles NE. A weather observation recorded at Laurens County Airport (KLUX), 21.6 miles away and five minutes from the reported time, showed calm wind, 10 statute miles visibility, clear skies and 68°F. The observation is an instrument reading at a nearby field and is not a stated factor in the accident. As a matter of record, the NTSB database, which begins in 2008, contains 95 other cases involving the , of which 29 involved a fatality. That count is not a safety rate and says nothing about the cause of this accident, which remains under investigation.

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Reference data

From aircraft and geographic registries, not from the news sources. Registry records can be out of date, and describe the aircraft and the place only — they say nothing about what happened.

Registration
N1151H
Type
Mooney M20J — single-engine piston landplane
Engines
LYCOMING I0360 SER A&C
Registered owner
Mooney N1151h LlcThe owner of record is not necessarily the operator, the pilot, or otherwise connected to the flight.
Terrain elevation
574 ft
Nearest aerodrome
0.5 miles NNW of Union County, Troy Shelton Field (K35A/USC)

Sources

Revision history

  1. Version 27 Aug 2026, 14:06current

    Added headline and dek, clarified that the 574 ft elevation is that of the settlement rather than the accident site, and added owner-background source URLs to sources_cited.

  2. Version 15 Aug 2026, 16:09

    First published.

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