Family and friends of the 11 jumpers and pilot killed when their shortly after taking off in Missouri on Sunday said they loved their hobby — whether it was to find personal peace or to share a once-in-a-lifetime experience with others. They remembered the as people who may have had regular jobs to pay their bills but free falling brought both the thrill and the serenity they craved.

The coroner in Bent County, Missouri, this week . Among them was Jennifer L. Sharp, of Grand Junction.

Sharp, 55, took her first jump in 1989 when she was 18. Some 6,800 jumps later, she was a legendary instructor at the highest levels of the sport and the coach for 25-year-old Blake Thacker’s certification that weekend.

On her blog, Sharp wrote about how she jumped into Denver’s Coors Field ballpark while dressed as the queen of England and loved to go tandem with people skydiving for the first time and to see them test their resolve, grow personally and just feel alive.

“Being trained by Jen Sharp was like taking piano lessons from Beethoven,” her friend Greg Upper told The Associated Press, calling Sharp a philosopher. “That¶¶Ňőap how big of a deal she was.”

Plane crashed shortly after takeoff

The plane was barely off the ground Sunday — only about 100 feet in the air — when it made an abrupt left turn before crashing on a sunny day. It appeared to be losing power, witnesses said.

Skydive Kansas City operated the single-engine turboprop Pacific Aerospace 750XL built in 2010 out of an airport in the small town of Butler, roughly 65 miles (105 kilometers) south of Kansas City.

The plane arrived in Butler for the first time on June 5, according to data from FlightRadar24.com. Pictures of the aircraft posted on social media showed it still had advertising from Chattanooga Skydiving Co. Its flight history showed it had previously been flying for weeks at a time in Tennessee and Wisconsin.

A woman who answered the phone at the Chattanooga Skydiving Co. hung up Tuesday when a reporter identified himself.

The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating leading to the crash including how much experience the pilot had with this model of plane and any mechanical or structural problems with the aircraft.

The 12 people killed were identified as Sharp, Thacker, Kurt John Roy, Michael Shanahan, David Hershberger, Sai Karthik Varma Datla, Matthew Swope, Dustin McKinney, Marcus Miller, Nicholas Nash, William Fischer and Dane Cordes, according to the Bates County Coroner’s Office.

Skydiving helped one jumper get sober

McKinney’s wife said her husband was meticulous about safety when he jumped after his love for skydiving prompted him to get sober seven years ago.

“It feels like this is the only way that skydiving could have taken out Dustin, because it was such a freak accident,” Kathryn Nold said. “It was the most horrific thing. It¶¶Ňőap still very surreal.”

McKinney, 44, of Stilwell, Kansas, worked at a furniture store and played drums in Kansas City-area bands. The father of two also had a part-time paying gig as a videographer for Skydive Kansas City.

“He could just immediately make people feel seen and warm and want to be around him, and I just feel infinitely lucky that we were the center of his world and able to experience that love from him that he gave so effortlessly to everyone,” Nold said of her high school sweetheart.

Honoring his sister by jumping

Shanahan, 54, of Kansas City, took up skydiving just before his older sister Nikki died from breast cancer in 2016, his mother said Tuesday.

“He wanted to live his life and make it worth having fun, having a good time, doing something he enjoyed, and skydiving was something he had always wanted to do, unbeknownst to us,” Gloria Shanahan told The Associated Press.

Shanahan honored his sister by skydiving on her birthday, Mother’s Day and the anniversary of her death. He then visited her grave.

Shanahan jumped Saturday just for fun. He booked Sunday’s jump as a backup in case the weather was bad but decided to go ahead and jump both days anyway, his mother said.

“We do not regret that he did. He got to live the life that he wanted to,” she said.

Shanahan’s skydiving instructor was Hershberger, who was on the plane with him Sunday. The two had another bond. Hershberger taught violin to two of Shanahan’s grandchildren.

Hershberger, 54, of Liberty, Missouri, also taught orchestra and played trumpet with the Kansas City Wind Symphony. His summers were spent at Skydive Kansas City, often harnessed to inexperienced jumpers exhilarated and nervous to cross something off their bucket lists.

Skydiving to find out more about yourself

Thacker, of Olathe, Kansas, jumped for seven years since first skydiving on his 18th birthday. He was set to get his skydiving coach certification over the weekend, his mother Sherry said.

“Skydiving had given him the confidence to do other things in his life, to be successful and reach for things maybe he thought he wasn’t good enough to do,” she said.

Thacker was an aviation software engineer and his mother saw that same methodical safety-oriented focus in his hobby.

“He said, ’Mom the danger in skydiving is really not the diving it¶¶Ňőap the plane,’” she recalled.

Swope, 39, of Independence, Missouri, worked in IT, but every weekend he was up in the sky as he searched for any bit of fun, especially something he could share with others, his best friend, Justin Williams, said.

“He loved it. He gets to take people on their once-in-a-lifetime adventure every weekend, multiple times a day,” Williams said.

After Swope’s death, Williams said, he’s terrified to go skydiving again but also knows he has to because his friend knew to truly live is to take risks.

“It¶¶Ňőap scary to be in the door, but the moment you let go, it dissolves away and induces a state of presence that you will not find anywhere else,” Williams said of free falling. “You don’t worry about the future. You’re not sad about the past. You’re just present, and it¶¶Ňőap the most peaceful experience.”

The skydiving industry says it has a strong safety record. The United States Parachute Association said that last year nearly 3.5 million jumps were completed and that 16 civilians died, the majority from human error.

___

Associated Press reporters Josh Funk in Omaha, Nebraska; Claudia Lauer in Philadelphia; and Jeffrey Collins in Columbia, South Carolina, contributed to this report.

Michael Mott, 41, died from multiple blunt and sharp force injuries caused by the plane engine, Denver Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Sterling McLaren said in a Tuesday morning news conference at the airport.

“As a scientific investigation, we can’t really know, really, what someone’s intent was,” McLaren said. “The best way to determine manner is to evaluate the totality of the investigation — scene findings, circumstances and history. Based on all of those findings together, we determined the manner of death to be suicide.”

The fatal crash happened just before 11:20 p.m. Friday, minutes after Mott jumped the Denver airport’s 8-foot security fence topped with barbed wire and walked onto a runway, airport officials said. The collision sparked an engine fire and created a 4,000-foot debris field, Denver International Airport CEO Phil Washington said during Tuesday’s news conference.

Mott’s breach of the airport’s security fence and trek onto a runway is an unusual airport disaster, but it is leading the public to raise questions about security around the massive international airport, which is one of the busiest in the world.

“I cannot think of a time when this has occurred,” said Jeffrey Price, an aviation and aerospace science professor at the Metropolitan State University of Denver, who has worked in the industry for decades.

Price said he can’t remember another incident that rises to this level, calling it “extraordinarily rare.” The pedestrian strike has the potential to raise high-level questions about whether safety requirements should be updated at airports across the board, he said.

Los Angeles-bound Frontier 4345 was accelerating for takeoff when it struck and killed Mott. The crash started an engine fire, and the 231 passengers and flight crew on board evacuated the plane via slides.

Twelve people reported minor injuries from the evacuation, and paramedics took five to the hospital. As of Tuesday morning, four of the hospitalized passengers had been released.

The Federal Aviation Administration, Transportation Security Administration, Denver Police Department, Frontier Airlines and DIA are all participating in the crash investigation, .

“Safety is paramount in everything that we do,” Washington said. “It is paramount in the aviation industry in general, and it is definitely paramount at DEN.”

A radar system on the fence detected ground movement and set off an alarm at 11:10 p.m. Friday, Washington said. When the operator on duty reviewed the alarm, they spotted a herd of deer outside the fence and did not see a trespasser, he said. The radar had detected the animals and the man.

Minutes after the alarm sounded, the airport was alerted that the pedestrian had been hit on a runway roughly 650 feet from the fence line, Washington said.

“Given the short time period, we were not able to intervene and prevent this person from reaching the runway,” he said.

A gulch between the fence line and the runway may have obscured Mott from the camera’s view, Washington said. The Denver airport’s security team will work to ensure cameras have a clear line of sight in those areas.

Washington said the airport has fielded questions in the days since the crash about why the security fence isn’t electrified, and why razor wire hasn’t replaced the barbed wire on top. The answer is simple — he doesn’t want the fence to be deadly.

Tom Foley, associate professor and program coordinator for Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University’s global security and intelligence studies department, said the preliminary reports on how Mott breached the airport fence do not indicate a security failure at the Denver airport.

“It sounded like somebody managed to get past the gate and they got hit by a plane before anyone could get to them,” Foley said.

Even if the security personnel had seen Mott when the alarm sounded, it still would have taken time to reach him because police officers cannot just start driving across taxiways and runways, Foley said. There’s no direct path from Point A to Point B at a large, busy airport.

“Two minutes is not a lot of time to react and stop this for an airport the size of DIA,” he said.

Trespassers have hopped the fence before, but most have been dealt with quickly and efficiently, Washington said. He did not specify how many such breaches the airport has recorded.

Federal investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board are still gathering information about the emergency evacuation to determine whether an investigation is warranted. As of Tuesday morning, they had not yet decided on the investigation, NTSB spokesperson Sarah Sulick said.

NTSB teams investigate civil aviation accidents with “substantial damage to an aircraft” or “serious injuries,” Sulick said. The fatal trespassing incident is a criminal matter and not under investigation by NTSB.

Airport workers examined the perimeter fence after the incident and found it to be intact, Washington said.

DIA’s perimeter fence spans roughly 36 miles, Washington said. It appears that most of the property is surrounded by a chain-link fence with barbed wire laced across the top and slanted toward the outside borders, according to a Denver Post reporter’s drive around the perimeter. Security officers monitor who is coming and going at traffic entry points, which are blocked by gates.

Denver’s airport has six runways, with the longest covering three miles. The pedestrian strike happened on runway 17L, one of the farthest from the terminal.

“There’s nothing out there,” Cary Grant, a retired United Airlines crew member and assistant professor at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, said of the remote runway. Grant flew out of Denver for 23 years.

Grant could not recall another incident where a pedestrian had wandered onto a remote runway and been killed. Typically, people who are killed on runways are airport workers who mistakenly get in the way of a plane on a busy ramp, he said.

Crashes and injuries are more common — though not routine — on taxiways and near the gate area, Price said. There are people towing planes, directing traffic and transporting luggage, a lot more moving parts, he said.

“The runways are such a protected environment at airports,” Price said. “Everyone knows you don’t go out there without proper clearance.”

FAA requirements only specify that the airport must provide “safeguards to prevent inadvertent entry to the movement area by unauthorized persons or vehicles” and “reasonable protection of persons and property from aircraft blast,” . TSA requirements are more extensive and are airport-specific.

On average, perimeter fences are required to reach minimum heights of 6 to 8 feet with barbed wire at the top, Price said.

“It¶¶Ňőap basically whatever TSA says it should be for that airport,” Price said. “DIA’s required height is in their Airport Security Program, which is a protected document. I do know they meet the standard, though, or else TSA wouldn’t allow it.”

Climbing the fence is not that difficult, Price said. It is designed as a deterrent and a delaying measure to stop people from accessing planes before airport officials can respond.

Grant said he once was on board a United flight that hit a coyote on a DIA runway. Security fences are designed to prevent deer and other wildlife from accessing the airport grounds just as much as people, he said.

Some airports exceed TSA’s standards, but most simply meet the minimum requirements, Price said. Installing taller fencing around airports’ miles-long perimeters is “extraordinarily expensive” compared to how infrequently incidents occur, he said.

“It simply does not happen often enough to justify the expense, at least not yet,” Price said.

As for solutions, Foley, the global security expert, said he did not have an immediate, easy fix that could prevent people from wandering onto DIA’s runways. Security personnel will need to evaluate the risk, the likelihood of it happening again, and the expense of higher fencing.

Denver International Airport’s team could decide to move the perimeter fence further away from the runways, giving security more time to respond. But that would depend on how much land the airport owns and what the expense would be, he said.

Passengers on Frontier plane that killed man on DIA runway intend to sue, law firms announce

"It might just be a risk you have to live with," Foley said. "I wish I had a quick and dirty answer to say, 'Oh, you can do this and it will never happen again,' but it's not that simple."

Some people on board expressed concern about the evacuation, including being stuck in the plane for several minutes as smoke filled the cabin and being left on the tarmac in the cold once they were out. Videos posted to social media also showed passengers coming down the emergency slide with what looked to be their carry-on bags and backpacks.

Pre-flight instructions from airplane crews always include a reminder to leave personal belongings behind during an evacuation, Grant said.

"What do people do? They grab their carry-on and head to the slides," he said. "That¶¶Ňőap where they get hurt. It slows the evacuation, and there’s an increase in the likelihood of getting injured.”

Deciding to evacuate is always a tough call, he said. Experience and research show that keeping people on an airplane often is the safest option.

"The crew has to use their best judgment," he said.

Washington called the actions of the Frontier pilot and crew "exceptional."

"This could have been far worse," he said. "We are indebted to their professionalism."

The magazine was found as the Phoenix-bound flight prepared to take off from DIA, Frontier spokesperson Rob Harris said in a statement. The plane was scheduled to depart at 8:08 p.m. Sunday.

“As a matter of precaution, passengers were deplaned and rescreened,” Harris said. “The aircraft also underwent a security sweep with no additional findings.”

Harris said investigators believe the magazine belonged to a law enforcement officer on a previous flight, who likely left it on the plane.

Airport officials responded to the “security incident” to investigate, but no injuries were reported, an unidentified DIA spokesperson stated.

Neither the airport nor the airline has said where or how the gun magazine was discovered, or how it made it onto the plane.

Gun parts — including magazines, clips, bolts and firing pins — are prohibited in carry-on baggage, but may be transported in checked baggage, .

TSA officials did not respond Monday morning to requests for comment.

The delay caused the crew on to exceed their duty time, and passengers were rebooked on an early Monday flight, Harris said.

That plane took off from DIA just before 6 a.m. Monday and landed in Arizona shortly before 7 a.m., .

Frontier’s latest security incident comes just days after a pedestrian jumped the Denver airport’s perimeter fence and was killed by a departing plane from that airline. The National Transportation Safety Board was collecting information Sunday to determine if an investigation into the plane’s emergency evacuation after the fatal crash was warranted.

This is a developing story and may be updated.

Emergency crews responded to the airport at 11:19 p.m. after during takeoff, DIA officials said in a statement early Saturday.

Denver Fire Department crews quickly extinguished the engine fire on the Airbus A321, and passengers evacuated the plane via slides. Twelve people reported minor injuries, and five were taken to the hospital, according to the airport.

A video on social media showed the Los Angeles-bound flight speeding up for takeoff before the collision, then a loud noise as flames and debris are seen outside the plane, near wing and engine.

Airport officials said the pedestrian, who has not been identified, jumped over a perimeter fence about two minutes before the crash. DIA officials do not believe the person was an airport employee.

Airport workers “examined the fence line and found it to be intact,” DIA leaders said on X at 7:31 a.m.

Air traffic control recordings confirmed the crash and engine fire, according to the site .

“We’re stopping on the runway,” the pilot told the control tower in the recording. “We just hit somebody. We have an engine fire.”

The air traffic controller responded that they are “rolling the trucks now” before the pilot told the tower about “smoke in the aircraft. We are going to evacuate on the runway.”

Frontier Airlines Flight 4345 hits person on runway — Engine fire reported.

ATC Audio:
• “Tower, Frontier 4345, we’re stopping on the runway.”
• “Uh, there we just hit somebody… we have an engine fire.”
Crew reports 231 souls on board + fuel…

— SLCScanner (@SLCScanner)

There were 223 passengers and seven crew members on the Frontier flight, and most passengers were taken to the terminal by bus and have since left on a different Frontier flight, DIA and airline officials said.

One of those passengers, Victoria Lohman, she heard a “huge bang” as the plane was going down the runway.

“Everyone got really frightened, and understandably so,” she said.

Another passenger, Jacob Athens, posted a video showing people sliding down with their backpacks. He also posted photos of what looked like a damaged engine.

“As we were lifting off, the engine of the plane exploded. There was so much smoke we couldn’t even see 1 ft in front of us,” Athens said on his Facebook page, adding that passengers had to wait for more than an hour on the runway.

Denver police said the crash is under investigation, and no additional information was available as of Saturday afternoon.

The crash did not appear to impact other DIA flights on Saturday, with only 113 delays and reported by airlines on FlightAware.

Airport officials notified the National Transportation Safety Board about the collision and said runway 17L reopened as of 11 a.m.

NTSB spokesperson Sarah Taylor Sulick said the agency is coordinating with the Federal Aviation Administration, airport authorities and local police to gather information about the crash. The FAA also confirmed an investigation.

U.S. released a statement about the crash on X, stating that “no one should EVER trespass on an airport.”

The crash comes one day after a Delta Air Lines employee was killed while on the job at the Orlando International Airport in Florida. In a statement, Delta officials said the employee was killed Thursday night without providing details of the incident nor the name of the employee.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

One person was injured and a plane suffered “substantial” damage when a United Airlines flight collided with two de-icing trucks at Denver International Airport in March after taxiing without clearance, according to investigators.

The United plane was parked on a de-icing pad when the flight crew heard what they believed to be the de-icing crew wrapping up the task and debriefing, according to a preliminary report from the National Transportation Safety Board.

The flight crew conducted all post-de-icing checks and received clearance to taxi from air traffic control, the report stated. However, when they started to move, they hit the de-icing trucks, pushing at least one onto its side. At that time, the flight crew was informed by the de-icing team that they had not been cleared to exit the pad and that the plane had hit the trucks, according to the report.

United Airlines initially reported that a de-icing truck had hit the plane.

One truck driver sustained minor injuries in the March 6 collision, which happened at about 10:24 a.m. None of the 136 people on board the Nashville-bound United plane — including pilots, flight attendants and passengers — were injured, according to the report.

The United plane, a Boeing 737, suffered “substantial” damage to the wings, which hit the trucks, according to the preliminary report.

Federal transportation officials said the investigation remains ongoing and involves NTSB specialists, the Federal Aviation Administration and United Airlines.

The crash happened in the early hours of Feb. 13 when an Epic E1000 airplane carrying Tennessee residents Aaron Stokes, Jakson Stokes, Colin Stokes and Austin Huskey hit Emerald Mountain, 3 miles south of the Steamboat Springs Airport.

The flight departed from John C. Tune Airport in Nashville, Tennessee at 7:10 p.m. that evening and stopped for fuel at Kansas City Downtown Airport in Missouri at 11:03 p.m., the published Feb. 28.

Air traffic controllers gave the pilot approach information and then changed to a different radio frequency to communicate with him after he mentioned “RNAV 32,” an approach that is not authorized for night use.

The pilot acknowledged the frequency change but did not send out any other messages, NTSB officials said. Air traffic controllers then sent out an alert notice.

Federal investigators found an 80-foot crash scar at 8,175 feet elevation, 75 feet below the approximately 8,250-foot peak of Emerald Mountain.

Flight data showed the plane was operating normally at the time of the crash and was flying on autopilot, federal officials said. While the minimum descent altitude for that approach is 9,100 feet, the plane’s last recorded altitude was 8,221 feet, according to the NTSB.

Six days after the crash, the issued a notice that pilots are prohibited from taking the “RNAV 32” approach into Steamboat Springs used by the Epic E1000, agency records show.

The “Procedure NA,” which stands for not authorized, is in effect until October.

Federal officials will publish a final report for the crash, including the probable cause and contributing factors, within two years, according to the NTSB.

, 47; Jakson Stokes, 21; Colin Stokes, 21; and Austin Huskey, 37, were identified as the four people who died when a turboprop plane headed to Bob Adams Airport crashed on Emerald Mountain just outside of Steamboat Springs, the coroner’s office said in an email.

The crash happened early Friday under “unknown circumstances,” the National Transportation Safety Board said.

According to an obituary posted online, in Franklin, Tenn., and the organization helps small auto shops through professional development and coaching.

“Aaron was passionate about transforming the automotive sector, guiding shop owners to focus on strategic business development rather than just day-to-day operations,” his obituary states.

was the chief executive of Huskey Building Supply, also in Franklin, the company said in a post on Instagram.

“As part of the third-generation ownership of Huskey Building Supply, Austin Huskey continued his family’s legacy through generosity and ingenuity,” company officials wrote. “His faithful work saw Huskey continue to thrive in the midst of nationwide economic uncertainty.”

Both men were husbands and fathers, according to the statements.

Jakson Stokes was Aaron Stokes’ son, and Colin Stokes was his nephew, according to reporting from .

NTSB officials are investigating the crash, and a preliminary report will be released within 30 days, according to the agency.

An Epic Aircraft E1000 headed to Steamboat Springs crashed in a remote area on the south side of Emerald Mountain just after midnight Friday, Routt County Sheriff Doug Scherar and the National Transportation Safety Board confirmed.

County officials are working to notify next of kin before releasing the names of those who died, but believe three of the people who died belonged to the same family, Routt County Coroner Mitch Locke said.

In a statement, Scherar said the plane crashed as it was approaching the Bob Adams Airport in Steamboat Springs from the south. The crash site is near the top of Emerald Mountain in a remote area.

The area near the crash site is marked with yellow tape, and access is restricted. Scherar asked the public to respect the closure.

The circumstances around the crash are unknown and an NTSB investigator is headed to the scene and expected to arrive shortly, federal officials said Friday evening. The investigator will document the scene and examine the aircraft, which will then be moved to a secure facility to be evaluated further.

Federal flight data shows the turboprop plane was owned by ALS Aviation LLC in Franklin, Tenn., and was purchased in 2024, while the company was formed on Dec. 7, 2021.

Franklin is located about 20 minutes from the Nashville International Airport and 30 minutes from the John C. Tune Airport, which handles private jet and turboprop flights and is popular with musicians in the area. Information on the plane’s flight history is blocked on public tracking sites, a strategy some celebrities use to maintain privacy. The Epic E1000 is a higher-end single-engine turboprop.

Anyone who witnessed or has information about the crash can contact the NTSB at witness@ntsb.gov.

No one was injured in the accident, which occurred just before 6:15 p.m. near the intersection of Wolfensberger Road and Prairie Hawk Drive, said Taylor Temby, a police spokeswoman.

She did not immediately know how many people were in the plane.

As a result of the crash, Prairie Hawk Drive is closed from Wolfensberger Road to Switch Grass Drive, Temby said.

The and have both been notified of the crash, she said.

The two planes — a Cessna 172 and an Extra Flugzeugbau EA300, each carrying a pilot and a safety pilot — were trying to land on the same runway at the airport when they crashed and caught fire at about 10:40 a.m. on Aug. 31, according to a from the .

Federal investigators said the Cessna pilot was conducting flight instrument training at the airport with a safety pilot aboard, and he made multiple radio calls to alert the airport to his arrival.

He heard two other airplanes in the traffic pattern, and that one had already landed, as he continued to approach, according to the report.

The Extra 300 pilot was one of several that day, investigators said. He also made several radio calls stating his plan to land on runway 14, where the crash happened, after completing his flight sequence.

According to the report, the Extra 300 pilot heard another competitor would be landing before him, but didn’t hear any other planes in the traffic pattern. The Extra 300 pilot told investigators that the Cessna appeared below him on final approach, with no time to maneuver or avoid the collision.

The crashed planes came to a stop next to each other, off the edge of the runway, federal investigators said. A line of wreckage and debris extended roughly 500 feet from the planes, including separated wings and propellers.

Both people in the Cessna exited the plane with minor injuries, according to NTSB. The Extra 300 pilot sustained serious injuries but was able to get out of his aircraft. Federal officials said a post-crash fire prevented him from saving the safety pilot still trapped inside.

The safety pilot, , died from her injuries, according to the , which was hosting the competition that day.

Morris was a retired Air Force captain and an Air Force Wounded Warriors coach, leading injured active-duty Air Force members and veterans in sporting events, according to .

“She was doing something she loved, and I will forever remember her as one of the most kind and pure-hearted people I’ve ever met,” Morris’s friend, Allison Smith, told Denver7.

Investigators said both planes were destroyed in the crash, and the remains were taken to an NTSB facility for further examination.

The crash remains under investigation.