e pilot of a plane owned by a former Green Party candidate and activist died after it crashed in northwest suburban Marengo.
Fire
crews were dispatched at 7:29 a.m. after someone spotted the wreckage
of a single-engine plane in an area off of Meyer Road just north of
Pleasant Grove Road, according to Marengo firefighter Joe Taylor.
The home-built Zenair CH601 small
aircraft crashed in a field under “unknown circumstances” and the pilot
was killed, according to FAA spokesman Tony Molinaro. The pilot was the
only occupant.
McHenry County
Coroner Anne L. Majewski confirmed that a man was pronounced dead at the
scene of the crash, but he was not identified Saturday. An autopsy was
scheduled for Monday morning.
The crash appeared to have occurred sometime between Friday night and early Saturday morning, Taylor said.
The
tail number of the plane provided by the National Transportation
Security Board, N4218, was the same as that of a plane shown in a
photograph on the website of activist and atheism advocate Rob Sherman.
The plane in the photograph is an orange, Zenair CH601 with his name
stenciled on the side.
Sherman ran as a Green Party
candidate for the state’s 5th Congressional District this year and was
the Cook County Green Party chairman in 2012.
Previously,
Sherman ran for state representative of Illinois 53rd Congressional
District in 2008, according to his website. He was also a well-known
advocate for issues surrounding the separation of church and state and
atheism.
According to his website, Sherman is an airplane construction engineer and builds light sport planes for revenue.
Attempts to reach Sherman by the Chicago Sun-Times were not successful
The FAA and NTSB will be investigating the crash.
"The
plane was in the process of being moved to a secure facility on
Saturday ahead of a winter storm, Keith Holloway, a spoIt looks like the team may reconvene on Monday for further examination and documentation of the aircraft,” Holloway said.kesman for NTSB
said.
.
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