Crash

n RCMP member investigates the scene of an accident involving a fan propelled parachute aircraft during during the 2010 Threshermen’s Reunion in Austin, Man. on Sunday afternoon. The pilot of the plane was taken to hospital with minor injuries. The crash of an ultralight parachute aircraft in Austin was caused by lost lift in a...
Read more »

A small float plane crashed into suburban Vancouver’s Pitt Lake on Monday, but the pilot walked away without a scratch. Pilot Jean-Claude Carrara of North Vancouver was the only person on board when his ultralight float plane lost power on approach to the lake. “Within 50 feet of the water, my engine just quit,” Carrara told...
Read more »

Experimental Plane Crash Claims Two in Western PATwo men from Western Pennsylvania are dead following the crash of their experimental aircraft on Saturday. According to Holly Baker, spokeswoman of the Federal Aviation Administration, the aircraft came down late Saturday morning around 11:20 am. The downed plane was found in the woods southeast of Franklin/Venango...
Read more »

MOUNT PLEASANT — A single-engine experimental aircraft appeared wobbly and unstable landing on the runway at Cooper Regional Airport and then headed nearly straight up into the air before flipping upside down and crashing July 19, according to a preliminary report released by the NTSB. The National Transportation and Safety Board report says Rabe was...
Read more »

A North Vancouver homeowner says he’s glad a paraglider who crash-landed on his roof only suffered a broken leg and sore back. “I was taking a nap, felt the house shaking and heard a bang,” homeowner Mike Glendenning told Metro Vancouver. “I thought it was an earthquake tremor at first. Then...
Read more »

FAIRBANKS — What’s the difference between being mentally unstable and just plain stupid? If you’re mentally unstable, you get strapped to a backboard and flown off Mount McKinley in an Army helicopter. The National Park Service might even hand you a bill for thousands of dollars for the rescue. You might even get a ticket for...
Read more »

A Sorrento man trying out his motorized paraglider was injured when he crashed near a DeBary ballpark Thursday night, according to a police report. Thomas Evers was injured when the paraglider crashed after he took off from Sullivan Park on Highbanks Road around 7:30PM. Evers crashed into the woods surrounding the park and injured his...
Read more »

HE MAY never paraglide again, but Peter Scott is relishing simple activities after being bedridden for two months. The Devonport resident has been recuperating in hospital after paragliding off North Head and crashing on Cheltenham Beach, breaking two vertebrae. “I left my house on February 28 at 10am to go and watch the tsunami come in...
Read more »

Enderby RCMP responded to a plane crash in the Deep Creek area Saturday afternoon that resulted in the death of a West Kelowna man. Glenn Ashton, 47, had just taken off from a field near Mallory Road when his ultralight airplane appeared to stall before nose-diving into the ground. “He had gone up to demonstrate the...
Read more »

Jon Wenzel wanted a plane all his life, and he finally got one in 2003 — an ultralight aircraft that he flew as often as he could. On June 23, the craft crashed northeast of Fort Lupton, and Wenzel died. He was 86. “He loved to fly and flew every chance he got,” said his daughter,...
Read more »

An 80-year-old man was seriously injured Monday morning when the ultralight aircraft he was piloting crashed near the 4400 block of Middle Valley Road in Camp Verde. Yavapai County Sheriff’s deputies who responded to the call said Robert Worgull of Camp Verde piloted a “homebuilt” type, “Hornet” ultralight airplane. A witness told deputies he heard a...
Read more »

A Sunday night plane crash killed a Carmi man at Carmi Municipal Airport. Carmi Police Chief Randy Hamblin identified the man as Paul E. Drone, 62. Drone was a well-known Carmi businessman who operated Carmi Lumber with his brother, Don. A complete obituary appears on the back page of today’s issue. Hamblin said a 911 call came...
Read more »

A 66-year-old Bennett Valley pilot and his passenger were killed Thursday in a plane crash near the Truckee Tahoe Airport. Raymond Rotge, a retired commercial pilot and member of a Sonoma County small-aircraft club, was at the controls of his two-seater when it went down. Mack Johnston, 71, of Chewelah, Wash., also died died when...
Read more »

LINCOLN, CA – Two people were killed when their plane crashed into the ground at Lincoln Regional Airport just after 8 p.m. Monday, according to an FAA spokesman. A pilot and one passenger were aboard the ultralight, single-engine experimental Rans Coyotte aircraft when it lost control and crashed just east of the tarmac at...
Read more »

A Ballwin, Mo. man was killed Sunday morning after his paraglider struck a pickup truck traveling down a road near Columbia. Andrey Azarskova, 40, was attempting to take off from a field east of Ramsey Road in his power paraglider just before 11 a.m. Sunday when he lost control of the paraglider. The...
Read more »

A World War II-era biplane flying into Reagan National Airport to promote a film premiere flipped over Tuesday during its landing, temporarily closing the airport’s main runway. No one was injured. Check out this in cockpit video:
Read more »

COLLINSVILLE, OK — The National Transportation Safety Board has released its preliminary report on a plane crash that killed a Broken Arrow man and his mother. Kevin Covell, 44, and his mother, 84-year-old Charlotte Covell, died on May 29th when their small, experimental aircraft went down in a field near the Airman Acres airstrip. 5/31/2010 Related story:  Obituaries Provide New...
Read more »

Rookie flyer Roy Dixon has made a remarkable recovery after crashing the £300 paraglider he bought on eBay. Roy broke his back in two places after the doomed maiden voyage, which he attempted after watching video clips on the Youtube website. The 45-year-old admits he got “half way” through a book of instructions before taking to...
Read more »

Thompson High School graduate Frankie Fuller was celebrating his graduation in Panama City Beach, Fla., June 4, when three of his toes were severed in a freak accident with a paraglider. Joni Fuller, Frankie’s mother, said her son was on the beach with some friends at approximately 2:30 p.m. when a man with a gas-powered paraglider began to...
Read more »

A grandfather-of-two was left trapped on a tiny cliff ledge for 14 hours with a broken shoulder, elbow and foot after his tandem paraglider pilot crashed into the side of a mountain. Roger Parker, 70, was in agony and petrified that he would die as he lay on a ledge over a 300ft drop surrounded...
Read more »

The Transportation Safety Board has conducted a cursory investigation of Sunday night’s ultralight aircraft crash and will not visit the crash site. Don Enns, regional manager of the board’s Ontario office, said an investigator gathered information from the pilot by phone. “Essentially there isn’t going to be anything more in-depth,” now that the pilot has been...
Read more »

RAPIDAN — Witnesses said a well-known Mankato businessman was able to get up and walk away from his powered parachute after it crashed near the Dam Store Cafe at about 11 a.m. Monday. Curt Fisher, 61, owner of Coldwell Banker Comercial Fisher Group, was taken to Immanuel St. Joseph’s Hospital by ambulance after the crash....
Read more »

TULSA COUNTY — The Oklahoma Highway Patrol has confirmed that there are two fatalities in a small, private plane crash near Collinsville. The plane came down near the 12600 block of North 75th East Avenue at about 10 a.m. Saturday. Officials on the scene said the plane took off from Airman Acres, a private landing strip, then had...
Read more »

CHESTER — At 11:03 a.m. Saturday, eight-year volunteer firefighter Josh Powley was asleep in his Tinicum home when a call came over his radio. “Aircraft down and rescue with two victims in the water,” it said. He jumped up and raced down to the Tinicum Township Fire Co. station. He then boarded a boat docked at...
Read more »

A novice pilot – who had no training – broke his back in a terrifying crash after tethering his paraglider to a car and taking to the skies. Roy Dixon had no experience of the dangerous pastime when he bought the paraglider for £300 from the auction website eBay. The 45-year-old thrill-seeker admits he was only...
Read more »

A Hollidaysburg man died Friday afternoon when his experimental plane crashed into a field short of a runway in southern Virginia. Herbert G. Rutter, 80, of 1101 Hedge St. may have been flying his self-built Long-EZ to an airplane festival being held at nearby Suffolk Executive Airport this weekend. Authorities don’t know the cause of the...
Read more »

Update: A pilot received spinal injuries and had to be extricated from his ultralight airplane after it struck a tree in a field he was using as a runway Thursday night in Aquasco, officials said. The pilot, a man in his 50s, was repeatedly taxiing up and down a field when he lost control and his...
Read more »

TWO men in an ultralight aircraft crashed while taking off at French Island National Park yesterday. Both men were flown to Frankston Hospital, one with cuts on his leg. Ambulance Victoria spokeswoman Susannah Wilson said the injured man was in his late 40s. She said it was understood the incident occurred as the men were trying to...
Read more »

The “powerchute” ultralight aircraft operated by the Escambia County (Ala.) Sheriff’s Department crashed in a wooded area near Flomaton this morning. Chief Deputy Mike Lambert, who was piloting the aircraft, suffered a minor leg injury, according to Sheriff Grover Smith. A passenger in the aircraft was not injured. Smith said the passenger was an undercover...
Read more »

A paraglider got himself caught in a tree along Rattlesnake Trail near Skofield Park, 1819 Las Canoas Road, on Sunday afternoon and had to be rescued. There were no injuries in the incident. Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department spokesman Drew Sugars said the sheriff’s Search and Rescue Team responded at about 2:30 p.m. to a...
Read more »

Neighbors say shortly after 5:00 p.m., they saw the pilot flying very low and they knew something was wrong.  Mary Evans says the light blue plane was only barely clearing nearby trees before she began to hear the engine stall out. “When he turned and banked…boy, she began to cut out,” Evans said of the...
Read more »

Kathryn Grace Moran had flown over the Big Island many times in a helicopter during the year she worked as a dispatcher and parts clerk for Paradise Helicopters. But Wednesday, as a 37th birthday present, her friend Tedd Robert Hecklin took her flying on his two-person motorized glider. It was a flight neither survived. Hecklin’s Airborne Outback...
Read more »

Two men were hospitalized after their small aircraft struck power lines in rural Potter County on Sunday evening. The sheriff’s office said the two unidentified men were in an ultralight craft that struck the lines in the 8500 block of Webb Road, just north of El Rancho Road, shortly after 7 p.m. The condition of the...
Read more »

A 43 year old man has been admitted to Royal Perth Hospital after crashing his paraglider. Inspector Gary Lewis says the man, from Baldivis, was flying near Serpentine yesterday when his glider collapsed and he fell more than 50 metres to the ground. “The glider appears to have been deflated, causing the man to fall to...
Read more »

HILO, Hawaii (HawaiiNewsNow) – The Hawaii County medical examiner has concluded autopsies on two people who were killed in a Wednesday morning ultralight plane crash off Kealakekua Bay. The medical examiner determined that pilot Tedd Hecklin and passenger Kathryn Moran died from multiple traumatic injuries when the “aerial trike” tour...
Read more »

Two men were taken to hospital after their paraglider hit some overhead power cables. Emergency crews were called to a field off Grimley Lane in Finstall near Bromsgrove, Worcestershire, at about 2000 BST on Wednesday. One man, aged in his 30s, complained of chest and back pain. The second is thought to...
Read more »

Kealakekua, Hawaii- A pilot and sole passenger aboard an ultralight aircraft that crashed into Kealakekua Bay on Wednesday morning have both been killed. Police say 38-year-old Tedd Robert Hecklin, owner of Tedd’s Flying Adventures in Kailua-Kona, and his female passenger, 37-year-old Kathryn Grace Moran of Kailua-Kona, were recovered from the scene and pronounced dead at...
Read more »

UPDATE:  MERCER — Veteran small-engine pilot Alton Carter said knew he was in trouble when his aircraft’s engine quit in the sky over Mercer Tuesday morning. Carter, 75, of Industry, said he quickly radioed his friend Donald Carr of Skowhegan, who also was flying Tuesday morning, telling him he was looking for an open field...
Read more »

MERCER, MAINE — A Federal Aviation Administration investigator was sent to Mercer today following the crash of a homemade “experimental” aircraft.  The aircraft appears to be a Super Kitten. Alton Carter, 75, of Industry, walked away from the crash with only scrapes from the seatbelt, he said. The crash happened around 10 a.m. in a...
Read more »

Aviation experts said a crash involving a kit-built helicopter in Middleboro last week highlights safety issues with do-it-yourself aircraft, which they say are involved in a disproportionately-high number of aviation accidents. According to data reported to the National Transportation Safety Board, at least 55 amateur-built helicopters have been involved in accidents since 2005. Those accidents...
Read more »

17 News is learning more about a local veterinarian who is feared dead after the experimental plane he was in crashed just north of San Diego. Family members says 58-year-old Van Snow was piloting his home built airplane when something went wrong and the plane crashed in Borrego Springs. We had previously reported that Snow was...
Read more »

A 21-year-old Lower Austrian has been dubbed Austria’s worst paraglider after crashing three times in as many weeks. Police said today (Fri) the Amstetten-based man emerged unharmed after plunging into a forest near Ternberg, Upper Austria, on Wednesday. He was brought to safety by the local fire brigade after his parachute got entangled in treetops. The incident...
Read more »

A flight for what police call an “experimental flying machine” went wrong on Friday night. Lisa Capitani, 27, of Waterbury, took flight in a powered-parachute aircraft and crashed head-on into a gate in Fairfield Hills, the Newtown Bee reports. The parachute failed to open and… Read more
Read more »

State police identified the two victims of a plane crash Friday evening near Summit Airport that left a man dead and his wife in critical condition. Phillip Lopez, 69, of Brandywine Hundred, was killed and his wife, Patricia Lopez, 69, remains in critical condition in Christiana Hospital, state police Sgt. Walter Newton said. A spokeswoman at...
Read more »

LANTANA — Authorities pulled an experimental aircraft from the waters of Lake Osborne after it crashed following take-off from the Lantana Airport Saturday afternoon, claiming the life of its pilot. Michael Cupaiole, 58, of Boynton Beach, was pronounced dead at the scene shortly after Palm Beach County Sheriff’s deputies pulled him from...
Read more »

Johns Island — A kit-built, ultralight plane crashed into the marsh along the Stono River on Thursday, killing the pilot. Rescue workers work in the marsh along the Stono River Thursday, after an ultralight airplane crashed killing one person just a short distance from the Johns Island Executive Airport. John A. Ratcliffe, 70, of Johns Island,...
Read more »

A man flying a paraplane got himself caught in a bit of pickle Thursday afternoon. The pilot crashed his brightly-colored powered parachute into some trees in Valley Forge Park in Upper Merion Township a little bit before 5 p.m. The Malvern, Pa. man crashed his engine-powered parachute after he ran out of fuel. Lance Altemose was stuck for nearly two hours. A Coast Guard helicopter...
Read more »

OCONEE COUNTY — Emergency workers searched an area of Hartwell Lake after reports Wednesday night that an ultralight plane might have crashed. But the search was stopped just after 10 p.m. No evidence was found that a crash actually occurred, said Steven Adams, assistant rescue coordinator for Oconee County. Adams said there were no plans to resume...
Read more »

A man died after the rotor blades of his gyrocopter cut through the tail section as he prepared to land at an airfield in North Dorset, a report has found. Brian Errington-Weddle, 57, was killed on impact when his RAF 2000 kit-built gyrocopter came down near the village of Kington Magna, close to Henstridge airfield,...
Read more »

RABAT — Rescuers on Tuesday found the body of a brother of the United Arab Emirates president, four days after his ultralight aircraft crashed into a Moroccan lake, investigators said. Sheikh Ahmed bin Zayed al-Nahayan was the managing director of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), considered the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund with assets...
Read more »

Richard Van Vleet has seen plenty of pretend drama in a long career as an actor, but on Friday afternoon he got some of the real kind when he was forced to make an emergency landing of his experimental aircraft on a remote road in Ventura County’s rugged backcountry after the engine lost power...
Read more »

WILLOWS — A Paradise man, whose small airplane lost power and crashed as he was coming in for a landing Wednesday morning at Willows Airport, walked away without injuries. Pilot Carl Donald Stuckey, 62, told the Glenn County Sheriff’s Office he was above the runway when his Kit Fox XL single-engine experimental plane lost power. Stuckey...
Read more »

Two people are confirmed dead after two small airplanes apparently collided in midair south of Williston late Saturday morning. The collision occurred in the air above a rural area about three miles south of Williston off County Road 322 at about 11:51 a.m. Saturday, according to Levy County Sheriff’s Capt. Evan Sullivan, who said he...
Read more »

A 28-year-old man was freed from a tree in V.A. Barrie Park Wednesday evening after his paraglider crashed in the treetop to avoid hitting the ground. St. Thomas police and firefighters were called to the Sunset Drive disc golf park just after 7 p.m. after a neighbourhood resident called to report a glider stuck in...
Read more »

PHOENIX – New details are emerging about a pilot pulled from the wreckage of an experimental plane. It turns out this was not his first crash and past Federal Aviation Administration investigations found him to be reckless. The pilot is reportedly in critical condition at the Maricopa Medical Center. The hospital is no longer releasing information...
Read more »

HUNTSVILLE, Ark. (AP) – Authorities say a Rogers man was killed when the experimental airplane he was piloting crashed in the backyard of a Huntsville residence. Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Lynn Lunsford says the accident happened about 1 p.m. Thursday near the northwest Arkansas town’s airport. Madison County Sheriff Phillip Morgan identified the pilot as 36-year-old...
Read more »

GILA RIVER RESERVATION – A plane went down Wednesday morning on the Gila River Reservation near 51st Avenue and Pecos. The pilot spent more than eight hours in the desert, his body stuck underneath the aircraft. Now that man, whose name has not been released, is recovering in the hospital. Dave Martin, with the Gila River...
Read more »

Leo Callahan can tell you what it’s like to plop uninvited into the middle of a top secret spy base. And live to laugh about it. Last year Callahan, a Hampton man, was forced to make an emergency landing of his experimental aircraft at Camp Peary, the CIA training facility for rookie agents. Callahan is a member...
Read more »

HILTON HEAD, SC (WCSC) – An experimental single-engine plane crash landed on the beach in the Palmetto Dunes area of Hilton Head Island, killing one person exercising on the beach, according to Hilton Head Fire and Rescue. Both the pilot and his passenger were not injured. A fire and rescue spokesman said the Lancair IV-P...
Read more »

Pilot Mike Curtin’s touch-and-go didn’t go so well Sunday afternoon but he won praise for landing his disabled airplane at Pearson Field. Now he needs to fix the experimental plane that he built himself. As he landed the KIT B200 craft, the damaged left wheel and undercarriage collapsed and he skidded to a safe stop on...
Read more »

When a World War II-era fighter plane dipped below the trees at an alarming speed, Karie Russell thought for sure she would see the plane rise back up again. Instead, she saw a mushroom cloud. The single-engine, single-seat plane crashed into the corner of a hangar at Stellar Airpark in Chandler on Thursday afternoon, setting the...
Read more »

SAN MARCOS, Calif.—The pilot of a experimental plane made an emergency landing in traffic lanes of a San Diego County street after the single engine died, causing no injuries or damage. The home-built, single-seat aircraft touched down safely Saturday morning in the eastbound lanes of San Marcos Boulevard in San Marcos. The pilot, William David Leonard...
Read more »

COURTENAY – A 75 year-old Comox Valley man has died following the crash of a home-built aircraft just outside of Courtenay. Several witnesses called 911 when they observed the plane break apart in mid-air while the plane was performing “stunts.” The experienced pilot was the only occupant aboard the Jodel F-11 when it experienced difficulties....
Read more »

Thousand of experimental airplanes are flying overhead. Some of them are planes built from kits in someone’s garage or hangar. But how safe are they? Federal authorities say experimental airplanes account for four percent of all the flight time in the U.S. yet they make up 24% of all plane crashes. When one crashed in the Ozarks...
Read more »

BUENA, Wash. — A pilot was injured when his ultralight aircraft nose-dived late this afternoon at the Buena Airport on the Yakima Valley Highway, authorities said. “The gentleman was doing some touch and gos,” said Capt. J.J. Ihnen of Yakima Fire District 5. “I believe he had just lifted back off and was climbing and...
Read more »

A 75-year-old man from Courtenay, B.C., is dead after his small plane crashed in Comox Valley on Vancouver Island. RCMP received a 911 call Wednesday morning after a witness saw the small plane come apart and then crash. Read more “Witnesses said that a piece of the wing fell off and he made a descent into the...
Read more »

Two people are lucky to be unharmed, after their plane crashes just outside of Falfurrias. It happened just before 7:30 p.m. Sunday night at Cage Ranch. Officials say a San Antonio couple, Charles Mcdougal and his wife Madeline, were flying to Mcallen when they started having engine trouble. They had to crash land here...
Read more »

A 55-year-old Turlock man died Sunday after his ultralight plane folded in half and fell from the sky while he did stunts 800 feet above the New Jerusalem Airport southeast of Tracy. The pilot was doing flips in the small plane shortly after 2:30 p.m. when one of its wings snapped, Mike Jefferson, a hang...
Read more »

POKHARA: A Russian paraglider was killed when he fell down a cliff while trying to fly in Pokhara today. Alexander Kirdyakshkin, 31, jumped off the cliff at Dhikidanda in Armala VDC, but his glider failed to open. Prior to the accident, the Civil Aviation Office (CAO), Pokhara, had toured the surrounding hills of Pokhara in a...
Read more »

On 8 May 2008 Francois came in for a toplanding on our local Auckland flying site Glover Park (aka the “G-Spot”). Toplanding here is always difficult, but especially so when the wind is due North. This day it was… When the wind is due North a very stable (but vicious) rotor establishes just behind...
Read more »

WILLISTON, Fla. — Two men were injured but in stable condition after their small, experimental airplane crashed during an emergency landing about 20 miles south of Gainesville. The Levy County Sheriff’s Office says 65-year-old Phillip Seay Sr. and his son were flying in a 1974 experimental airplane on Sunday morning when the aircraft experienced an...
Read more »

Life sometimes comes down to one decision. Ted Tollner and Fred Brown are alive today because they graciously gave up their airplane seats 50 years ago. Tollner and Brown were among 19 football players who survived the Cal Poly San Luis Obispo plane crash Oct. 29, 1960, in Toledo, Ohio, that took the lives of...
Read more »

LIHU‘E — The Virginia engineer whose leg was broken in two places during an accident aboard a Birds in Paradise ultralight aircraft last summer filed a federal lawsuit claiming pilot negligence in the accident, Honolulu U.S. court records show. The pilot, Thomas Defino, “denies any liability for the accident,” said Gregory Markham, who is Defino’s...
Read more »

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Amateur pilot James Riordan has been in a few scrapes in his 30 years of flying, but this represented a major test: a conked-out engine and no obvious place to land. So the 63-year-old Cameron Park, Calif., businessman made an emergency landing this morning on Highway 50 in El Dorado Hills, touching...
Read more »

A 21-year-old paraglider was rescued Thursday afternoon after his craft stalled while he was practicing maneuvers over Torrey Pines Gliderport. San Diego Lifeguard Lt. Nick Lerma said the pilot told rescuers when he stalled, lost altitude and hit the cliff below the gliderport. He landed in a ravine about 40 to 60 feet above the...
Read more »

Pilot was so busy gabbing on final that he failed to drop the gear.. To those involved in aviation, this is actually more common than you might think. You hear this horn enough times and it becomes background noise. For some it takes bending a prop and possibly replacing an engine and other expensive...
Read more »

This powered parachute was made by the same pilot who crashes in the stalls and falls video. This powered parachute was sold to a new customer who is being trained in it. The customer was not hurt, but did sustain some bad scratches. The PPC was rebuilt and the customer went on to become...
Read more »