Aircraft discovered in Lake Norman raising questions

LAKE NORMAN, N.C. —

 A plane found in Lake Norman is raising many questions.

The FAA told Eyewitness News a dive team first saw the plane when they were looking for a drowning victim in Lake Norman. Divers from another fire station, doing practice drills on the water with sonar, knew as soon as they spotted it they needed to get a closer look.

"They did a (primary) search of the plane just to make sure there wasn't any obvious victims or anything that stood out," Battalion Chief Kent Davis said.

Rescue workers said the doors of the plane couldn't be opened. The tail is 80 feet under the water, the nose 100. The FAA is involved, but they wouldn't say if the plane will be brought out of the water. Charlotte firefighters say they can't get the plane out unless it's part of an investigation, but they do want to know why it's in there.

"There's the folklore of drug runners on the lake and things like that," Davis said. "At this time it's just working with the FAA to determine whose plane it was and find out how it got there."

Neighbors believe someone has to know something about it.

"If there's a plane in there no doubt somebody should have reported a plane missing," Dick Mahoney said. "Family reporting pilots, it's very strange."

Mahoney has lived in this neighborhood for years and never heard of a plane crashing into the lake, never to be found.

"They can't let something like that go," he said.

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