Virtually no commercial traffic.

This airport was deadly for many years because, since it is located on a mountaintop, the runways were really too short for jet planes to land. Pilots who did not know how short the runways were almost always overshot. Lots of deaths. Eventually the surrounding mountaintops were flattened so that the runways could be extended, making Yeager much safer.

In a quick Google search, I found a cargo flight in 2017 that killed two, and a flight instructor who died the same year in a Cessna that flipped over. At the time, the Charleston Gazette reported that it was the first fixed-wing fatality at the airport since 1985.

I lived in Charleston for decades, and vaguely remember that 1985 crash, a drug runner who tried to land at the airport after hours.

My general experience in flying in and out of Charleston four times a month for decades was that airline pilots took landing at Yeager Airport very seriously, because the runways were relatively short and because the airport was built on three hilltops with sharp dropoffs at the end of the runways. The Air Force One pilots used to come down on Tuesday afternoons to do touch-and-go's, because the airport was terribly busy and because it's a technically trick landing.

Last edited Sat Jul 4, 2020, 11:21 AM - Edit history (1)

I lived in Charleston from age 4 until I left for college in 1965, long before they extended the runways.

I'm not mistaken about the many crashes at Yeager (which was then Kanawha County Airport, I think). There were horrible crashes every year. This was long before they even had those elevated lights guiding planes toward the airport. Jets really should have been banned until the runways were extended.

I searched Kanawha County Airport and most of the results came up from later, 2017 and later. The really bad crashes came during the fifties and sixties, but I think it would take a long time to winnow those out, if they're listed or not.

We lived on Michigan Ave.