Power restored after plane crashes near Centralia, lead to outages in Boone County
Ryan Shiner
BOONE COUNTY, Mo. (KMIZ)
Power has been restored in Hallsville Wednesday morning after a crop duster plane crashed near Centralia Tuesday afternoon.
An Ameren spokesperson told ABC 17 News in an email that a power outage occurred after a plane got caught on a power line and pulled it down. The plane took down several power lines with it and before coming to rest roughly 50 yards into a cornfield near Route CC at Angell School Road.
The road is currently blocked off as crews work to fix the power lines and keep the scene clear for an investigation. Boone County Joint Communications told ABC 17 News that the road will be closed until Wednesday afternoon, a time was not specified. The NTSB was notified while the MSHP took jurisdiction of the accident.
Emergency crews from Centralia, Hallsville, and Sturgeon were dispatched to the scene at 1:43 p.m.
“This is the time of year where they’re going to be out flying and doing some fungicide, is what he was actually spraying on the corn,” Assistant Boone County Fire Chief Gale Blomenkamp said. “Not really hazardous materials at this point and very little fuel spill from the aircraft.”
An ABC 17 News reporter saw a medical helicopter arrive on scene at 2:20 pm. Someone on a stretcher was then loaded into the helicopter, which flew away 25 minutes after arriving on scene.
“He was alert and conscious when we pulled him out of the aircraft and he was flown by helicopter to University Hospital,” Blomenkamp said.
NTSB has been notified and the MSHP has taken jurisdiction of the accident.”
Blomenkamp said the pilot was “alert and conscious” before he was flown to University Hospital.
More than 1,200 electricity customers were without power in Boone County on Tuesday afternoon.
Ameren’s outage map shows that 30 customers are without power from an outage just east of Centralia near Highway 22, while another 853 were without power near Highway 124 and about 350 were experiencing in Hallsville.
The City of Hallsville wrote on its social media that there is now no estimated time for power restoration. Ameren wrote in an email that outages will last into the evening.
“We were in town running some errands and then my 14-year-old son called me and said we were out of power,” Hallsville resident Danielle Leonard said. “My mother is staying with us right now because of medical concerns and the upstairs is where she stays and it’s very, very warm up there its almost 85 upstairs right now.”
Boone Electric is seeing 64 customers without power in two outages, with one occurring north of Highway 22 and a second occurring near Pierpont.