Little Rock: Authorities said five employees of an environmental consulting firm were killed when a small plane they were travelling in crashed near a Little Rock factory shortly after takeoff on Wednesday.

According to Pulaski County Sheriff's Office spokesman Lt. Cody Burk, the twin-engine plane crashed outside an industrial area in Little Rock, a few miles south of the Bill and Hillary Clinton National Airport. According to the Federal Aviation Administration, there were five people on board the plane.

The Beech BE20 had taken off from Little Rock Airport and was on its way to John Glenn Columbus International Airport in Columbus, Ohio, according to the FAA.

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Burk did not immediately release the names or ages of the passengers on the flight. The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board will investigate the crash, according to the FAA.

CTEH, a North Little Rock-based environmental consulting firm, said the five people on board the plane, including the pilot, were its employees. According to a company spokesman, the employees were responding to an explosion this week at an Ohio metals plant that killed one worker and sent more than a dozen to the hospital.

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"We are incredibly saddened to report the loss of our Little Rock colleagues," CTEH senior vice president Paul Nony said in a statement. "We ask that everyone keep the families of those who died, as well as the entire CTEH team, in their thoughts and prayers."

The crash occurred as a line of thunderstorms moved through the Little Rock area, with wind gusts of 40 mph (64 kph), according to the National Weather Service. Burk stated that it would be up to the investigators to determine whether weather played a role.

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Residents in the area reported seeing a large fire caused by the crash. Dennis Gordon told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette that he was standing on a street near the crash when he heard an explosion and then the wind pick up. Gordon told the newspaper that several smaller explosions followed, followed by a massive fire.

"It started out red, then it turned black, and there's this burnt smell," Gordon told the newspaper.