2010 Austin Plane Crash

Approximately an hour before the crash, Stack allegedly set fire to his $230,000 house located on Dapplegrey Lane in North Austin. He then drove to a hangar he rented at Georgetown Municipal Airport, approximately 20 miles to the north. He boarded his single-engine Piper Dakota airplane and was cleared to take off around 9:45 a.m. Central Standard Time. He indicated to the control tower his flight would be "going southbound, sir." After taking off his final words were "thanks for your help, have a great day."

About ten minutes later his plane descended and collided at full speed into Echelon I, a building containing offices for 190 IRS employees, resulting in a large fireball and explosion.

A pilot slammed his small plane into a seven-story building that housed the local office of the Internal Revenue Service Thursday, apparently killing himself and one agency employee, in what federal officials described as a deliberate suicide attack amid a long-running tax dispute.

Investigators are looking into whether the pilot, 53-year-old Andrew Joseph Stack, also set his house on fire before taking off in his single-engine Piper Dakota around 9:40 a.m. local time.

In what authorities describe as an apparent intentional act, a pilot flew a single-engine plane Thursday into a Northwest Austin office building that houses Internal Revenue Service offices, igniting a huge explosion, jolting terrified employees to the floor and triggering a massive federal investigation.

The plane was registered to a software engineer identified as Andrew Joseph Stack III, 53. He posted a rambling Internet message before the crash railing against the U.S. tax system.

The remains of two people have been found in an Austin, Texas, building where a man crashed a small plane, authorities said.

The identities of the two dead people have not been confirmed, the Austin Fire Department said in a statement. Two other people who were injured in the incident were taken to a hospital, and 11 others were treated for minor injuries, Austin Police Chief Art Acevedo said.