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2nd fatal crash this year for Chicago Executive Airport

Wednesday's crash at Chicago Executive Airport comes less than a year after an approaching Learjet charter plane crashed.

Four businessmen were returning from Olathe, Kan., on Jan. 30, 2006, when the Cessna 421B piloted by one of them crashed just before landing at the Wheeling airport.

The NTSB ruled the plane wasn't going fast enough to stop an engine stall. The twin-engine Cessna fell from the sky around 6:30 p.m. into a vacant lot behind a Wheeling construction company, exploding on impact.

The victims where: Pilot Mark Turek, 59, of Winnetka, a senior financial adviser with Morgan Stanley; Michael Waugh, 37, of Algonquin, the first general manager for Shaw's Crab House in Schaumburg; Sybaris Pool Suites founder Ken Knudson, 61, of Lake Zurich; and financial adviser Scott Garland, 40, of Chicago's North Side.

A Cook County judge approved a $15 million settlement in a wrongful-death lawsuit filed by Waugh's family against Turek's estate and Morgan Stanley, charging the financial giant used aircraft flown by nonprofessional pilots.

On Oct. 30, 1996, a Gulfstream 4 plane crashed shortly after takeoff and went up in flames, killing four people: Arthur F. Quern, 54, of Evanston; the pilot Martin L. Koppie, 53, of Elgin; co-pilot Robert Whitener, 50, of St. Charles; and flight attendant Catherine Mio-Anderson, 33, of Wheeling.

A 12-year legal battle after the crash ended with Wheeling and Prospect Heights, which in 1986 purchased the airport from Priester Aviation, signing off an a $6 million settlement.