A small plane crashed Wednesday morning in a field off County Road 344, injuring the pilot who is reportedly a flight school student.

The Cessna 152 aircraft went down at 10:34 a.m. near the intersection of SW 47th Court and County Road 344 in a field owned by Ben Colson.

The body of the two-seater plane stayed intact as it hit the ground, flipped over and settled, explained Major Tony Smith of the Gilchrist County Sheriff’s Office.

Pilot Anup Sudhkar, of India, incurred a possible broken nose in the crash, while his passenger Anil Nayak, also of India, was uninjured.

Deputy Megan Wooten of the Gilchrist County Sheriff’s Office indicated that both the pilot and the passenger were able to provide passport information, flying permits/license, and school identifications at the time of the crash.

According to Smith, the men were returning to their flight school, Sunrise Aviation in Ormond Beach, after embarking on a short flight at 8:30 a.m.

Sudhkar told Deputy Wooten that he and Nayak were on a scheduled flight to Cross City and landed at 10 a.m. The plane stayed on the ground at the Cross City Airport long enough for the men to use the restroom and take off once again.
While enroute back to Ormond Beach, the pilot reported engine trouble shortly before the plane went down in west Gilchrist County.

Sudhkar said he sent out a “mayday” distress signal to the Cross City Airport, but he did not receive a response before they were forced to begin looking for a place to land.

The plane was only in the air for a few minutes before it crashed on the Colson Farm property.

The student pilots were apparently trying to upgrade their license by attending flight school at the time of the crash.

Both the pilot and the passenger refused medical care from Gilchrist County EMS.

Michael Cichanowski, a safety inspector with the Federal Aviation Administration, is currently investigating the crash.