``We have no confirmation of any people alive. We believe we have two fatalities,'' said Doug Rambo, a spokesman for the Loudoun County Department of Fire and Rescue. Virginia State Police spokesman Sgt. Wallace Bouldin said there were two people dead.
Rambo described the crash scene as being a very rural hillside with trees.
``The aircraft is in a small patch of woods adjacent to a single family residence. The residence was not damaged in the crash,'' Rambo said. He estimated the house was about 30 yards from where the fuselage came to a rest.
Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Jim Peters said the plane was a Cessna 310 twin engine that had left Naples, Fla., and was on its way to Leesburg Executive Airport when it crashed.
``It crashed four miles from the airport,'' Peters told WUSA-TV in Washington, D.C.
In April 2003, the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board began studying safety enhancements at the airport following three fatal crashes in nine months.
The wrecks include the March 20, 2003 crash of a single-engine Mooney M20 aircraft on approach to the airport; the March 1, 2003 crash of a TBM-700 turboprop in western Leesburg; and a July 6, 2002, crash of another small plane. Five people died in the wrecks.
Kraig Troxell, spokesman for the Loudoun County Sheriff's Office, which is assisting state police on the investigation, said the area of the crash is referred to locally as ``Leesburg Mountain.'' It was the site of a fatal plane crash a few years ago that killed a Broad Run High School teacher.
