This photo of the heavily damaged aircraft facing the direction of travel was included in the FAA report this week.

An odor of smoke was an early sign something was wrong, a preliminary Federal Aviation Administration report says regarding the 10:11 a.m. Aug. 5 crash landing and fire of a Cessna 750 at the Chautauqua County Airport near Jamestown.

While the pilot, who has been identified as Orchard Park businessman Gerald Buchheit, was seriously injured, the copilot who first sensed the smoke had minor injuries. The aircraft, owned by Access Stripe, was en route from Dunkirk to Fort Lauderdale to collect airplane parts and a mechanic for work on another company airplane at the north county airport.

Not long after takeoff, air traffic control communication data revealed a Buffalo approach controller advising the flight to expect a clearance to flight level of 47,000 feet that brought no response from the crew. After multiple unsuccessful attempts, the controller contacted Cleveland to see if the flight had switched to its radio frequency.

“About 5,000 feet in the initial climb, (the copilot) smelled ‘electrical smoke,’ but the pilot did not,” the report said. “The copilot then no longer detected the smell but as the airplane reached about 8,000 feet in the climb, both pilots detected the smell of electrical smoke. Both pilots stated there was an odor of smoke but no visible smoke.”

Later, the Buffalo controller established intermittent contact with the Cessna crew, that included

“very garbled” transmissions. The last transmission from the flight crew included “we are

about to land at Jamestown.”

As the airplane was at 10,000 feet, “accelerating… well over 250 (knots) with the nose trimming down,” the copilot said the “Master Caution” and panel segments illuminated,

along with other Crew Alerting System messages. He tried to contact the controller

before he noticed that “Comm 2 had failed, and the Garmin 5000 had big, red X’s,” the report said.

“The copilot described the actions of both crew members after landing as the cabin filled with

smoke and they assessed their best paths of (exit), as the airplane was surrounded by fire,” the report indicated. “Eventually, the pilot opened the main cabin door and both crew members egressed the airplane without assistance.”

Investigators said in the report the engines were examined visually and also displayed thermal damage consistent with post-impact fire, and there was no evidence of pre-impact mechanical anomaly. In addition, the copilot stated he monitored engine function throughout the flight and there were no CAS messages that related to the engines, and that neither engine malfunctioned.

FAA officials are identifying the crash as a Class 3 investigation, which seeks to identify safety issues that reveal underlying causes of the accident.