More than 75 injured in Reno air race crash

[LadyTevar]

Not 24 hrs later, THIS happened in Shepherdstown, WV

September 17, 2011
Pilot killed in W.V. air show crash

MARTINSBURG, W.Va. -- The pilot of a 1950s trainer aircraft has died after it crashed and burst into flames at a West Virginia air show, the second deadly air show crash in 24 hours.

No spectators were reported injured in the crash Saturday. At least nine people were killed in the crash of a P-51 Mustang in Reno, Nev., on Friday.

West Virginia air show officials posted a notice on their website encouraging those who witnessed the crash to seek support if they felt viewing it was traumatic.

The West Virginia Air National Guard said the pilot was a civilian, although they hadn't released his name Saturday evening.

Guard spokesman Lt. Nathan Mueller said the North American Aviation T-28 Trojan crashed while its pilot was performing a routine at the Thunder over the Blue Ridge Open House and Air Show in Martinsburg.

The fixed-wing, single-engine military aircraft was registered to John Mangan of Concord, N.C., and was built in 1958, according to a Federal Aviation Administration registry.

The Journal of Martinsburg reported that the aircraft lost control during a six-plane stunt formation and then crashed on a runway near the airfield's hangars. The plane was part of the T-28 Warbird Aerobatic Formation Demonstration Team, which performs at air shows around the country.

A message left at Mangan's North Carolina home was not returned Saturday.

[Broomstick]

Although the P-51 that crashed at Reno didn't have an airliner-style black box, apparently it did have some in-flight recording and monitoring that might be recoverable. From the The New York Times:

Flight Data Recovered in Crash at Air Race

RENO, Nev. — Federal officials announced on Sunday that they had recovered real-time flight information and a possible memory card from a video camera aboard the plane that crashed into a crowd at a Reno air race, killing nine people and injuring dozens of others.

Mark Rosekind, a member of the National Transportation Safety Board, said that investigators examining debris from the plane, a P-51 Mustang, had discovered a box containing another memory card, which is believed to have recorded information about the plane’s final moments.

The device is much simpler than the “black box” that commercial airliners are equipped with, Mr. Rosekind said, but could reveal important details about the conditions in the plane’s engine, as well as its velocity, altitude, location and other flight variables, something he called “very significant for the accident investigation.”

Mr. Rosekind said investigators had also learned that that same information had been transmitted from the P-51, a World War II-era fighter that had been modified and modernized, to a ground crew before it crashed.

Perhaps most intriguing, however, was news that the P-51 had also been equipped with a video camera, facing outward, pieces of which investigators also believe they have found. In addition, Mr. Rosekind said that several memory chips had also been recovered in the debris field, though it was not clear whether those were from the plane or from cameras held by spectators. Nor was it clear whether the chips — some caked in dust and fluid from the plane — were in good enough condition to be helpful, he said.

Thousands of visitors had come to the National Championship Air Races and Air Show at Reno-Stead Airport on Friday, only to watch in horror as the P-51, flown by Jimmy Leeward, 74, an experienced stunt pilot, suddenly jackknifed skyward during the last race. Mr. Leeward’s plane soared hundreds of feet in the air before twisting and falling nose-first into the crowd.

Medical examiners were still working to identify the dead on Sunday. All told, 69 people were treated for injuries, according to the Reno Police Department, and several people were still in critical condition on Sunday.

None of the dead had been formally identified, but the family of one victim came forward over the weekend. The Arizona Republic identified him as Michael Joseph Wogan, 22, of Phoenix, who had attended the races with his father, who was seriously injured in the accident but survived. Mr. Wogan, who used a wheelchair because of muscular dystrophy, died early Saturday.

On Sunday, Mr. Rosekind said there was no evidence that Mr. Leeward had made a mayday call before his fatal plunge, which created a six-foot-wide crater in the tarmac.

Howard Plagens, the N.T.S.B. official in charge of the investigation, said that the new evidence was a result of several painstaking examinations of the debris field, which was spread over several hundred feet and contained thousands of pieces of the demolished plane and other remnants of the accident.

The memory cards, flight information and camera fragments will all be sent to N.T.S.B. labs in Washington for analysis, Mr. Rosekind said, as will an unidentified plane component and a section of tail, though it was not completely clear whether the pieces belonged to the P-51.

That component was found in a location where some witnesses reported something falling off the P-51 in flight, though Mr. Rosekind repeatedly cautioned against rushing to conclusions that it would prove to be the reason for the crash. Photographs and videos taken by spectators would also be analyzed.

Investigators continued to work at the scene of the accident on Sunday and are expected to be on site for several more days. A preliminary report of the accident will be posted on the N.T.S.B. Web site on Friday, though the complete investigation would take months to complete and, Mr. Rosekind said, would most likely involve an examination of federal regulations on air races, a duty ascribed to the Federal Aviation Administration.

[Broomstick]

For those interested in eyewitness accounts, here's a link to something written by a survivor. He was only slightly injured despite being near to the impact site. Among other things, he mentions having to clean off himself dirt, oil, and "biological material". Enough that he just threw away the clothes he'd been wearing. This is NOT an investigative or authoritative account, it's more of a "this is what it was like to be there" account.