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NBC Sports Exec Injured in Colo. Jet Crash
MONTROSE, Colo. - NBC Sports Chairman and President Dick Ebersol survived a charter plane crash that killed at least two people Sunday, NBC said in a statement through its Denver affiliate KUSA-TV. The jet crashed through a fence and burst into flames at Montrose Regional Airport, which serves the Telluride Ski Area.
The network said the pilot and co-pilot were killed. Sheriff's officials said three survivors, including Ebersol, were seriously injured, and rescuers were searching for a sixth person listed on the plane's manifest whose seat from the plane was missing from the wreckage.
Identities of other victims were not immediately released pending notification of relatives, but KUSA said Ebersol's wife, actress Susan St. James, was not on the plane.
Authorities were searching for the missing person in rugged terrain by helicopter and on the ground.
Montrose County Sheriff's officials said two people were dead, but a Federal Aviation Administration (news - web sites) spokesman said three had died in the crash.
The crash occurred in an area covered with small brush and cedar trees, sheriff's Communications Supervisor David Learned said. A large drainage ditch also is at the site.
There was snow in the area but regional FAA (news - web sites) spokesman Allen Kenitzer said he did not know if it was a factor.
The plane was on its way to South Bend, Ind. Kenitzer identified the plane's tail number as N873G, a CL-601 Challenger registered to Jet Alliance of Millville, N.J.
An operator at Jet Alliance said she had no information about the crash.
Investigators from the FAA and National Safety Transportation Board were en route to the airport, 185 miles southwest of Denver.
Ebersol became president of NBC Sports in 1989, running a network division that has dwindled down to just the Olympics and smaller events like Wimbledon (news - web sites) tennis and professional golf. Last summer's Olympics in Athens proved to be very successful for NBC and for Ebersol, a protege of Roone Arledge, the former ABC sports executive who pioneered modern Olympic coverage.
Ebersol also worked as an NBC entertainment executive, and in the early 1980s was executive producer of Saturday Night Live, when Lorne Michaels left.