By JOSEPH B. NADEAU

LINCOLN — Three people escaped serious injury Friday evening when two planes operating at North Central State Airport collided on a runway.

The pilot of a twin-engine aircraft, reportedly an area resident, suffered abrasions and other minor injuries. He was transported by Smithfield Rescue to be checked out at Rhode Island Hospital, Smithfield Fire Chief Joseph Mollo said.
The occupants of the second, single-engine plane, two men reported to be taking off on a flight to New Jersey, did not suffer apparent injuries, Mollo said. The pair were checked out by rescue personnel at the scene, the chief said.
Smithfield fire crews responded to the initial 911 call from the airport just after 5:30 p.m., according to Mollo. They found the two planes about 750 feet apart on the runway with significant damage from the crash.
The single-engine plane had been in the process of taking off when the collision occurred, Mollo said. Its left wing was sheared off in the collision. The second plane also suffered damage to a wing and may have lost a small wing-tip fuel tank in the impact.
The single-engine plane was found to have leaked some fuel as a result of the crash but no fire resulted, according to Mollo. “They were all very lucky,” he said.
The accident was being investigated by state and federal aviation officials late Friday. The occupants were not identified while that probe continued.
Mollo said the crash was the first significant incident at the airport in a number of years. A single-engine plane taking off on a skydiving flight from North Central crashed in 1997, killing five of the six people aboard.
At the scene Friday evening, groups of investigators could be seen clustered around the two planes.
The twin-engine plane was upright on its wheels on the southwest side of the runway. The single-engine plane, more heavily damaged, appeared to be tipped over, resting in the grass along the edge of the runway parallel to Jenckes Hill Road.
Several state police cruisers parked on the runway with their lights flashing; two fire engines could also be seen near the planes.
The small state airport was reported to be closed to air traffic while the crash was under investigation. North Central does not a have a manned control tower;  pilots use radio communication and operational rules to fly in and out of the area.
Jack Ryan, a private pilot from Skippack, Penn., had attempted to fly out of North Central earlier in the day to make his way home by visual flight rules but returned after encountering low visibility.
Ryan said he was inside the North Central pilot office when he heard the planes collide. “I thought it sounded like a lightning storm and thunder and then I heard the dispatcher say ‘call 911,’” he said.
Next, Ryan saw the single-engine plane sliding down the runway. After it came to a stop, two occupants got out in a hurry. They started walking up the runway in the direction of the two-engine aircraft, which had come to a stop at a taxi strip, Ryan said.
The twin-engine plane was a six-seat Piper. The single-engine plane was a high performance Beechcraft that also likely seated six, Ryan said.
During his earlier flight, Ryan said he had encountered a cloud ceiling as low as 800 feet before turning around. A pilot with instrument ratings could fly in such weather, but he did not yet have that designation, Ryan noted.
Out near the airport fence along Jenckes Hill Road, the crash drew a crowd of spectators as well as an assemblage of television trucks and their crews.
Michelle Omar of Lincoln said she and her daughter, Haley, 7, stopped after dropping off her other daughter, Taylor, at a dance at Lincoln Middle School on Jenckes Hill Road.
“I think it would be awful if someone got hurt,” Omar said while surveying the two wrecks in the distance. “We just came by here the other day and I said I would never get into one of those little planes.”
Kathy DelSignore of Greenville said she had been out driving on Route 5 when she heard about the plane accident on the radio and decided to go take a look.
“I was brought up here and my father used to fly out here when I was young,” she said as she watched the scene through the fence.