Navy Resumes Flights Near Crash Site

SMYRNA, Ga. — Jets resumed flying from Dobbins Air Force Base north of Atlanta on Sunday, three days after an attack plane crashed into an apartment complex short of the runway, killing two people.

Petty Officer Linda Herring said the Navy considered Thursday’s crash an isolated incident and was not suspending any flight operations.

“If an investigation indicates that changes should be made, we will of course make them,” she said.

The investigation of the crash is expected to take at least 30 days.

Officials at Naval Air Station Atlanta, next to Dobbins, said earlier that pilots were taking a few days off from training flights in the wake of the crash.

The pilot of the A-7E Corsair II, Lt. Cmdr. Robert M. Conlyn Jr., 37, remained in critical condition Sunday. Conlyn was the only person aboard the unarmed plane and ejected just before it crashed into the apartment complex.

Jacquelyn Padovani, 5, who suffered burns over about half of her body, was in critical condition. Her pregnant mother, 28-year-old Margie Padovani, died Friday night at the hospital from burns, and Richard Dick, 24, died in his incinerated apartment.