Great Bend

Four killed when plane crashes in thunderstorm

Four people were killed when a single-engine plane crashed during a severe thunderstorm late Wednesday night, Barton County Sheriff Buck Causey said.

He said the plane took off from the Great Bend Airport, but he did not know its intended destination. It crashed about 11:30 p.m. in a wheat field about two miles southwest of Great Bend, the sheriff said.

A resident discovered the crash site about 7:45 a.m.

The sheriff said the victims of the crash, two men and two women, had not been positively identified.

Johnson City

Boy killed after falling from father’s tractor

A 6-year-old boy was killed in a farm accident Tuesday, Stanton County authorities said.

Cornelio Klassen Peterson, who lived in neighboring Grant County, was riding in a tractor driven by his father, Cornelio Klassen Sr., when a door popped open and he fell to the ground. He was run over before his father could stop the tractor and was dead at the scene, Undersheriff Gary Leiker said.

The accident happened on the property of Klassen’s employer, Ted Goertzen of Johnson City.