Colgan Air grounded at time of fatal crash

WEST GARDINER – A commercial airline that operates from the Augusta State Airport grounded its aircraft because of bad weather 11/2 hours before a California pilot took off in a private jet that crashed several miles away, killing the two people on board.

The pilot, telecommunications pioneer Jeanette Symons, appeared to be in a hurry and declined to have her Cessna Citation jet de-iced by Maine Instrument Flight before taking off Friday night, Maine Instrument Flight’s Chief Pilot David Smith told the Kennebec Journal.

Symons also neglected to turn on the runway lights, and her jet went into a ditch before finding the runway, said Bill Perry of Maine Instrument Flight.

The airport was open at the time but snow, ice and rain prompted Colgan Air Inc., which operates US Airways Express flights, to ground its aircraft.

Authorities say Symons of San Francisco and her 10-year-old son, Balan, were headed to Steamboat Springs, Colo. The State Medical Examiner’s Office hopes to confirm the victims’ identities through DNA by week’s end.

Shortly after takeoff, air-traffic controllers in Portland said Symons reported an on-board emergency involving one of the three indicators which tell a pilot whether the plane is level relative to the horizon. The Cessna Citation went down moments later in the woods of West Gardiner just miles from the airport.

It’s unclear whether the weather was a factor in the crash, and it could take months before the National Transportation Safety Board makes a final determination.

Symons founded Ascend Communications in 1989, which was later sold to Lucent Technologies for $24 billion, and was chief executive officer of Industrious Kid, a startup social networking Web site for children, which is based in Oakland, Calif.

Tim Donovan, vice president of marketing of Industrious Kid, said Symons had been flying for 15 to 20 years and “probably logged more hours than a commercial pilot.”

“She’d never take risks,” Donovan said. “She wouldn’t have left if she didn’t think she could take off safely.”