Doug Stanglin

USA TODAY

Myles Munroe, a prominent Christian minister from the Bahamas, and his wife, Ruth Munroe, were among nine people killed when a small plane crashed while attempting to land Sunday on the island of Grand Bahama, Prime Minister Perry Christie said Monday.

The popular 60-year-old televangelist, author and motivational speaker was president and founder of Bahamas Faith Ministries International and was traveling to Grand Bahama to attend the 2014 Global Leadership Forum, according to Christie. Several members of the minister's entourage were among those killed.

"It is utterly impossible to measure the magnitude of the Dr. Munroe's loss to the Bahamas and to the world," Christie said in a statement, The Nassau Guardian reports.

Calling the charismatic Munroe his "personal friend and spiritual mentor," Christie said he was "indisputably one of the most globally recognizable religious figures our nation has ever produced."

The Lear 36 executive jet, which had taken off from the Bahamian capital of Nassau, struck a shipping container crane at the Grand Bahama Ship Yard in Freeport as it tried to land around 5 p.m. in heavy rain, Foreign Minister Fred Mitchell said. Plane crashed into the ground near a junk yard.

Mitchell said that a commercial Bahamasair flight making the same route, from Nassau to Freeport, had turned back because it was unable to land around the same time.

As news of the tragedy spread, hundreds of Munroe's followers went to the crash site to light candles and pray, according to the Bahamas Tribune..

At the Global Leadership Summit, where participants had already gathered, many in the audience started screaming and crying when they were told about Munroe's death, the newspaper says.

Born in 1954 in the islands' capital of Nassau, Munroe founded Bahamas Faith Ministries International in the early 1980s after studying at Oral Roberts University, a Christian liberal arts school in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

The pastor quickly became an influential religious leader among many evangelical Christians, giving sermons around the world and occasionally appearing on televangelist Benny Hinn's popular programs.

He was also a motivational speaker and the author of numerous books, including the 2008 best-seller

God's Big Idea: Reclaiming God's Original Purpose for Your Life.



Former U.S. ambassador Andrew Young was scheduled to be on the flight, but, according to a spokesperson, felt "guided by the spirit" not to get on board, WXIA-TVin Atlanta reports.

In a statement on the Andrew J. Young Foundation Facebook page, Young expressed his "deep sadness" over the death of Munroe and his wife and "offers condolences to the Munroe family and the families of the other souls who lost their lives as a result of this shocking plane crash."

Grand Bahama is about 70 miles east of Florida.

Contributing: Duffie Dixon, WXIA-TV, Atlanta; Associated Press