16-year-old boy killed in plane crash near Virginia airport

A Virginia community is mourning a 16-year-old who died after the plane he was flying crashed near the Orange County Airport.

In the meantime, the National Transportation Safety Board is looking into what happened in the moments before the crash.

Grief counselors on the campus at Riverbend High School in Fredericksburg are not just trying to heal just students who are dealing with a loss of a classmate, but also a community who say they will never forget this great kid.

On Sunday during a solo flight in a 1974 Piper single-engine, fixed-wing plane, 16-year-old Ryan McCall crashed in a field just short of the airport.

The teenager has been a skyline flight student for over a year and was legally allowed to fly solo.

His family has been asking for time to heal while his friends have been on social media remembering their buddy with #RipRyanMcCall. But those in the community know it will be some time before many can get over the teenager who is now gone.

The NTSB will continue their investigation on what happened. But one of Ryan's instructors believes birds may be to blame for the crash.