Airplane Had Departed Wiley Post Airport In Oklahoma City

The U.S. Coast Guard is searching for a Cirrus S22T airplane that departed Wednesday from Wiley Post Airport in Oklahoma City and is believed to have gone down in the Gulf of Mexico.

ABC News reports that the pilot became unresponsive during the flight, and NORAD launched fighter aircraft from bases in Texas and Lousiana to make contact with the airplane which was scheduled to land in Texas, according to a filed flight plan.

In a statement, the FAA said that the airplane "left Wiley Post Airport in Oklahoma City this (Wednesday) afternoon and the pilot filed a flight plan to Georgetown, Texas. The pilot did not land in Georgetown, continued on the same course and was unresponsive to air traffic control instructions. The aircraft was last observed on radar about 219 miles northwest of Cancun at 15,000 ft. and was headed into the Gulf of Mexico."

Major Mary Ricks, a spokeswoman for NORAD, said that the F-16 pilots "tried to make radio communications contact with the pilot,as well as doing some basic military maneuvers around the aircraft to get the pilot’s attention but the pilot was unresponsive."

The NORAD pilots determined that the pilot was the only person on board the airplane.

NORAD contacted the U.S. Coast Guard once the plane was over the Gulf of Mexico. The State Department was also contacted so that the Mexican government could be kept appraised of the situation. Authorities in Mexico tracked the aircraft on radar until just after 1800 CST, at which time radar contact was lost.

The U.S. Coast Guard and Mexican Authorities continued to search for the plane through Thursday.

(Image from file. Not accident airplane)

FMI: Original Report