FAA, Company Agree to Settlements Over Wyoming Crash

The federal government and a company that provides air traffic control services at the Jackson Hole Airport have entered confidential settlements to end lawsuits brought by survivors of a Minnesota man and his three sons who died in a plane crash after taking off from the airport.

Forty-one-year-old Luke Bucklin, of Minneapolis, 14-year-old twins Nate and Nick, and 12-year-old Noah all died in 2010 when they crashed in Wyoming’s rugged Wind River Range.

The National Transportation Safety Board concluded last year that Bucklin’s decision to fly his heavily loaded plane over mountains in snowy weather probably caused the accident.

But the NTSB also noted that an air traffic controller employed by Serco Inc., a Virginia-based company, instructed Bucklin to fly over the mountains at too low an altitude.