Eleven passengers and a pilot who were taking off for a skydiving trip in Missouri were killed shortly after the plane’s initial ascent on Sunday, officials said, making it the worst airplane crash affecting the close community of skydivers around the rural town of Butler.
Emergency responders received a call about the plane crash just after 11:30 a.m. Central time, several local authorities said. All of the plane’s occupants were found dead in a field adjacent to the Butler Memorial Airport, an airfield operated by the town with the capacity to land small jets.
Local authorities do not yet know what caused the crash, but they said weather was unlikely to have been a factor. Investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board will arrive Monday to begin to determine what led to the crash.
Dennis Jacobs, the emergency management director in Butler, described the day as sunny after a night filled with thunderstorms, heavy winds and two inches of rain.
“It’s such a beautiful day that such a tragic thing happened,” he said. “It’s mind numbing.”
The Federal Aviation Administration said that air traffic services were not being provided at the time that the airplane, a Pacific Aerospace P750, crashed.
The aircraft was only about 100 feet in the air when it crashed soon after takeoff, Mr. Jacobs said, so soon that the occupants would not have been able to use their parachutes.
It seemed, he said, that the pilot was trying to gain altitude and, when unsuccessful, appeared to turn the plane to the left, most likely in an attempt to land on a flat roadway nearby. Instead, the plane stalled and crashed inside the airport’s perimeter, he said.
“There has never been a crash like this,” he said of the Butler airport, located in a town of about 4,000 people about 70 miles south of Kansas City.
The company that had operated the aircraft was Skydive Kansas City, the only skydiving business that used the airport, Mr. Jacobs said.
The company said in a statement that it was working with the local authorities, as well as the F.A.A. and the N.T.S.B. to help investigators and inform families of the victims’ deaths.
“This is a devastating loss for everyone connected to Skydive Kansas City and for the wider skydiving community,” the statement said. “Our deepest sympathies are with the families, friends and loved ones of all who were lost.”
Skydive Kansas City was founded in 1998, the same year that a fatal plane crash involving skydivers nearby rocked the industry. That crash, in a Kansas City suburb, and unrelated to the company involved in Sunday’s crash, killed the pilot and five skydivers. An investigation by the N.T.S.B. blamed the pilot.
On its website, Skydive Kansas City has noted its “impeccable safety record.” In January 2024, a private investment firm called Little Engine Ventures announced that it was acquiring the company. The parent company also owns skydiving businesses in Indianapolis and Beloit, Wis.
In May 2024, Skydive Kansas City lost a plane after a skydiver “scraped his emergency parachute handle while moving toward the jump door,” according to an N.T.S.B. report.
As a result, the first jumper’s emergency parachute deployed outside the airplane “and subsequently drug him into the horizontal stabilizer,” which is part of the tail of the aircraft. The skydiver was left with serious injuries, while the other five passengers, and the pilot, were able to jump out of the plane.
The skydiving community across the country is tightknit. On Sunday, many jumpers were grieving. Krystal Hall enrolled in Skydive Kansas City’s free fall program in 2024 and has completed four tandem jumps.
“This hits close to home,” Ms. Hall said, adding that she knows many of the divers and instructors at the company. She considered jumping today since the conditions were great, but said she chose to go to church with her husband instead.
Ms. Hall, 30, of Paola, Kan., said she was drawn to Skydive Kansas City because she felt that the company prioritized occupants’ safety.
“If I could jump with them again, I would go back and do it again 10 out of 10 times,” she said.
Brad Burr, the president of a parachute club at Kansas State University called Skydive K-State, said he had previously jumped or flown with some of the victims. He declined to share their names.
One person who died was a very close friend of his who was an instructor, he said.
“I’ve had a lot of jumps with her,” Mr. Burr said. “All of the people on that plane were very well qualified, for sure.”
Though deaths from civilian skydiving have decreased, several skydivers said that the risk of death or serious injury is inherently part of the activity.
“Unfortunately in this sport, we suffer loss,” Mr. Burr said. “This is one of those that we have to rebuild and grow from.”
