NTSB: Greenville pilot missed runway before fatally crashing in Rosewood area

COLUMBIA, S.C. (WOLO) – The National Transportation Safety Board says a pilot from Greenville missed the runway before fatally crashing into a home in the Rosewood area during a very foggy day earlier this month.

According to the preliminary report, on January 13, pilot Farhad Rostampour, 62, left the Greenville Downtown Airport in his Beech F33A Bonanza before 10 a.m. under visual flight rules, which means the weather was clear enough for him to see where the plane is going.

Officials say at 10:20 a.m., he requested an instrument flight rules clearance, which was later approved, while airborne and continued southeast toward Jim Hamilton L.B. Owens Airport (CUB) in Columbia.

The report says he asked air traffic control for a report that pilots provide control towers of weather conditions while in flight at around 10:15 a.m., and the controller replied with a report from 9:30 a.m.

Investigators say about one-third of a mile from the runway, the airplane started climbing a left turn and air traffic control gave Rostampour instructions on how to navigate a missed approach around 10:30 a.m.

Two minutes later, Rostampour told them he was performing a missed approach and requested the weather conditions at the airport.

A short time later, authorities say the plane, which was still turning left, disappeared from the radar and communication was lost, and air traffic control made several attempts to try and talk to Rostampour before the crash, but they didn’t get a response.

The report says a witness saw the plane emerge from the fog with its left wing low and it hit the roof of a home on Kennedy Street and crashed against a back fence before 11 a.m.

Columbia Fire Department officials say the home and the plane caught fire but they were both quickly contained, and the person inside the home during the crash only suffered minor injuries, unrelated to the crash.

According to investigators, visibility at the airport shortly after the crash was about one-quarter mile in the fog and 200 feet above the ground.

Witnesses who heard the airplane during the final moments of the flight, told investigators the engine sounded normal before the crash.

The cause of the crash remains under investigation.