$2.5 Million Settlement Reached with Plane Crash Victim's Family

By Thomas Hall

Published on October 18, 2006

The Federal Aviation Administration and Robinson Aviation Inc. will pay $2.5 million to the victim’s family for the Thanksgiving 2003 crash, which occurred near Craig Municipal Airport in Jacksonville. George C. Swanson, 56, had been piloting a Swearingen Merlin II from Port Arthur, Texas, to Jacksonville with four of his children on board when the plane crashed into a wooded area enveloped by fog. Swanson was killed, but his children all survived the crash.

Swanson’s family alleged that the airport had faulty equipment and that Swanson was not warned of his position by air traffic controllers.

A lawyer for the family, Donald M. Maciejewski, said an investigation revealed that Craig Airport had a radio landing system for almost 10 years that the government knew was out of specification but left unchanged. According to Maciejewski, pilots were not told of a government inspection that had indicated the glide slope antenna at Craig Airport was subject to course reversal affecting airplane landing instruments, especially in adverse weather.

Maciejewski added that the government changed the antenna to a modern system to correct the problem, and that air traffic controllers who handled Swanson’s plane have been reassigned.

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