Plane Headed For Sarasota Crashes

A Cessna 421 bound for Sarasota-Bradenton crashed in the Gulf of Mexico due to an unresponsive pilot after being watched by fighter jets and NORAD, CNN and The Herald-Tribune reports.

Flight tracking website Flight Aware reports that the plane departed Slidell, Louisiana and was headed for .

The plane crashed 120 miles west of Tampa at 12:10 p.m., a petty officer told The Herald-Tribune.

FAA records show that the Cessna was registered to Lee H. Aviation in Wilmington, Del., according to The Herald-Tribune.

The plane was cruising at 30,000 feet while over the Gulf, but Flight Aware shows that the plane last reported being at 10,000 feet afte a sharp dive, and hasn't reported altitude since noon, after an erratic pattern.

The Air Force are monitornig the situation, CNN reports:

The Air Force noticed the plane flying erratically over the Gulf of Mexico on Thursday morning and dispatched planes to check it out, said Chief Petty Officer John Edwards, a Coast Guard spokesman. They found the Cessna's windows were either iced or fogged over, and the pilot was not responding to radio calls, Edwards said.

Fighter jets from the North American Aerospace Defense Command intercepted the aircraft Thursday morning and are watching the plane from the air, NORAD spokeswoman Stacey Knott said.

Raycom News Network says the Cessna seats six and the fogged windows, could mean the cabin lost air pressure.

The FAA lost contact with the pilot at about 9 a.m., and if the plane had a full tank, it should have ran out of gas by 12:30 p.m., RNN reported.