Third Person Injured, All Associated With Tom Cruise Film 'Mena'

Two people were fatally injured Friday in Colombia when an Aerostar with three people on board went down in bad weather near Medellin. A third person suffered lesser injuries. All were associated with the production of the upcoming Tom Cruise movie "Mena."

Cruise, who is a pilot, was not on set at the time of the accident.

The online source TheWrap reports that the Aerostar had taken off from a small colonial town near Medellin when it encountered bad weather. There were two U.S. citizens on board and one Colombian.

Variety identifies those fatally injured as American pilot Alan David Purwin and Colombian Carlos Berl. A second American pilot, Jimmy Lee Garland, suffered severe injuries and is in a hospital in Medellin.

Purwin was the founder and president of Helinet Technologies, a Los Angeles, CA-based company that provides aerial surveillance for law enforcement and government agencies. He had worked on several films, including "Pearl Harbor" and "Pirates of the Caribbean".

A spokesperson for Universal Pictures said the the plane was "returning to Enrique Olaya Herrera Airport in Medellin following production wrap on the film."

The film is based on the story of a former TWA pilot who flew for cocaine lord Pablo Escobar, and later became a DEA informant.

(Aerostar pictured in file photo. Not accident airplane)

FMI: www.imdb.com/title/tt3532216/