The pilot killed Monday when his single-engine plane crashed near Ga. 400 in Dawson County was a prominent Atlanta plastic surgeon and professor at the Emory University School of Medicine.
Emory University Hospital Midtown confirmed Wednesday morning that the pilot was Dr. John H. Culbertson Jr., 62, of Atlanta.
According to the Emory School of Medicine website, Culbertson was an associate professor of surgery and was chief of the department of plastic surgery at Grady Memorial Hospital and at Emory University Hospital Midtown.
Culbertson was a 1978 graduate of the Emory School of Medicine and had been on the school’s faculty since 1986.
In 2000, Culbertson and four passengers escaped injury when he crash-landed a plane into 3 to 5 feet of water in an Arkansas field. Culbertson and his passengers were returning to DeKalb-Peachtree Airport from Telluride, Colo., when the plane lost power. The plane was “substantially damaged,” according to a Federal Aviation Administration report on the incident.
Culbertson owned and was piloting the same plane when it went down Monday evening in a field off Ga. 400 near Auraria Road in Dawson County.
The flight departed Morristown Municipal Airport in New Jersey and was headed to DeKalb-Peachtree Airport when air traffic controllers lost contact with the pilot shortly after 7 p.m., Kathleen Bergen, FAA spokeswoman, said.
The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating Monday’s fatal crash.
A family member contacted Tuesday by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution declined to comment on the crash.
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