SARASOTA -- The two Air Force F-16 jets were flying back to Georgia from a training mission in central Florida. At the same time, a small single-engine Cessna was circling over southern Manatee County.

The first F-16 rocketed through the area without difficulty. But the second fighter plane struck the Cessna 172, shattering the small plane and killing its pilot as dozens of stunned witnesses watched from the ground.

"Mayday! Mayday!" The F-16 pilot screamed into his radio as he steered the damaged plane toward a swamp off Interstate 75, then ejected and parachuted to safety.

"His plane started swinging back and forth, and then it just fell straight down. Flames went up 200 feet in the air. Everybody started running, but nobody knew where to run," said Adella Alvarez, working nearby at the Sarasota Outlet Mall.

It was unclear Thursday what caused the 4 p.m. collision, which killed Cessna pilot Jacques Olivier, 57, of Citrus County and rained wreckage over a wide area.

After two news conferences Thursday night, Air Force officials refused to release the name of the F-16's pilot, the altitude the planes were flying and whether the pilots were in contact with air traffic controllers. The Air Force, National Transportation Safety Board and Federal Aviation Administration are investigating.

The Cessna crashed on the second hole of the Rosedale Golf and Country Club course, just east of I-75 at State Road 70. Fuel from the plane sparked a brush fire.

The F-16 crashed behind a Home Depot under construction a few miles to the south, near I-75 and University Parkway. The F-16's pilot, an Air Force captain, had no major injuries.

The F-16s were flying back to Moody Air Force Base in Valdosta, Ga., after a training mission at the 106,000-acre Avon Park bombing range in central Florida, the Air Force said. That would not explain why witnesses reported seeing the F-16s flying south.

Witnesses reported seeing two Cessnas circling each other and "playing tag" shortly before the crash, said Larry Leinhauser of the Manatee County Department of Public Safety. The witnesses said one of the planes pulled away and the other headed north into the path of the F-16s.

"My children were watching the planes in the sky when they said, "Look, Daddy, they're coming down,' " said Jim Dellinger, 45, owner of Splash Pools in the Sarasota Outlet Mall.

He and co-worker Robert Gilbert, 39, ran outside and saw one of the F-16s dropping fast.

"He was headed straight for the parking lot," Dellinger said. "I grabbed my kids and pushed them in the building. Robert and I watched it crash together."

The F-16 fell below the tree line and exploded. A ball of flames rose into the air. As Dellinger grabbed his cell phone to call 911, he watched a parachute open in the sky.

"Let's find the pilot," Gilbert suggested.

The two men cut through a fence with a saw and drove a mile into a nearby field of palmetto bushes. Within a few minutes, they found the Air Force pilot standing in the palmettos.

"Are you all right?" Gilbert asked him.

"I think I am," the pilot replied. "Do I look okay?"

The pilot called his air base on Dellinger's phone.

"Then he called his wife," Dellinger said. "The guy was extremely composed."

The pilot had two more questions. He wanted to know if his plane landed in an area free of people, and if anyone was hurt.

The FAA said Thursday's collision occurred below 3,000 feet, although the precise altitude wasn't known.

The FAA said the Cessna 172 was flying under visual flight rules, meaning it was not being directed by air traffic controllers. The Cessna pilot was required to keep a safe distance from other aircraft, a practice known as "see and be seen."

It was unclear Thursday night whether the F-16 pilots were warned about the Cessna.

F-16s usually have a sophisticated radar system that tracks nearby aircraft, but Air Force Master Sgt. Greg Bade said the plane was not equipped with collision-avoidance radar.

It also was unclear whether the F-16s were being directed by air traffic controllers. If so, the controllers could have warned the military pilots about the Cessna.

Planes flying under visual rules, as the Cessna apparently was, still show up on radar, so controllers and the F-16 pilots should have been able to track the Cessna.

Senior Airman Trevor Tiernan, an Air Force spokesman, said the plane was an F-16C assigned to 69th Fighter Squadron at Moody Air Force Base. Tiernan said the Air Force follows FAA rules when flying over congested areas such as the Tampa Bay area. The rules mandate that planes stay at an altitude of at least 1,000 feet.

The Cessna's pilot, Olivier, worked as a flight instructor and charter pilot for Crystal Aero Group Inc., the company that manages the Inverness and Crystal River airports for Citrus County. Both airports cater primarily to small charter planes, beginner pilots and flying enthusiasts.

"He was a highly qualified pilot," said company owner Tom Davis.

Olivier had rented the Cessna from the company for his personal use Thursday, reserving it from noon to 6 p.m. He told colleagues that he was flying to Tampa, then to Lakeland, then back.

Olivier loved to fly and was a favorite among flight students. "He was very personal, very polite," said fellow employee Gudi Lashbrook.

Olivier and his wife, Danielle, lived in a newly developed neighborhood still under construction in the Citrus Hills community in central Citrus County. They have one daughter, Sophie, who lives in Paris.

Angel Vincent, a victims' advocate for the Citrus County Sheriff's Office, was at the Olivier home Thursday night and said the family did not wish to comment.

- Staff writer Bill Varian contributed to this report, which contains information from the Sarasota Herald Tribune.

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