Flight school plane crashes in Martin County; School owner and three others die

West Palm Beach, Florida: A flight school owner who defended his business despite its poor safety record died along with three Florida Atlantic University researchers today in a single-engine plane crash in western Martin County.
The Cessna he piloted slammed into a pasture and landed belly-up, calling the future of his troubled school into question.
Flying the 1999 Cessna Skyhawk 172S was Jeff Rozelle, 36, co-owner of Lantana-based Kemper Aviation, whose crash today was the third fatal wreck for the school’s fleet since Oct. 27. It brought the death toll in Kemper-related crashes to eight.
The four men killed were on the final flight of a three-year research project to study the migration of wading birds in the Everglades. All but Rozelle were affiliated with Florida Atlantic University, including graduate student Damion Marx, 35, of Boca Raton, who was studying integrated biology.
Also killed was Phil Heidemann, 43, a master’s student at FAU.
The third victim, Gareth Akerman, 36, of Halifax, Canada, was an ornithologist who had been working on a six-month contract with FAU to study migratory birds.
In 2004, Rozelle partnered with Akshay Mohan to form Rohan Aviation Inc. and bought Kemper.
With Rozelle’s death, the future of the flight school is uncertain. Rozelle headed the school in Lantana while his partner, Mohan, worked from India.
Reached in New Delhi, Col. Chander Mohan, who heads Kemper Aviation’s operations in that city, said he wasn’t sure whether the flight school would continue to operate.
“I have no idea,” said Chander Mohan, who is Akshay Mohan’s father. “Absolutely, Jeff is the only person who would have decided.”
13/03/08 Jill Taylor, Michael LaForgia and Kevin Deutsch/Palm Beach Post, United States

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