Plane crashes at Reno air show, described as "mass casualty event"

[FORD]

Plane crashes at Reno air show, 75 injured

RENO, Nev. -- A World War II era fighter plane plunged into the grandstands Friday during a popular annual air show, injuring at least 75 spectators and leaving a horrific scene of bodies and wreckage.

It wasn't immediately known if anyone died in the crash but a spokesman for the event called it a "mass casualty event." Video showed a chaotic scene with several people apparently badly wounded.

Stephanie Kruse, a spokeswoman for the Regional Emergency Medical Service Authority, said 25 people were critically injured and another 25 people were seriously injured in the crash. More than 25 more people were treated for minor injuries, she said.

Kruse said the critically injured were considered to have life-threatening injuries.

Airport personnel and military evacuated other spectators, and several emergency vehicles were headed to the scene.

The P-51 Mustang crashed into a box seat area at the front of the grandstand at about 4:30 p.m., said race spokesman Mike Draper said.

Draper identified the pilot of the P-51 Mustang as Jimmy Leeward. According to his Facebook page, Leeward has raced airplanes since the 1970s. A post on the page Friday afternoon said "Jimmy is starting up right now" and posted a link to live video of the airshow.

Jeff Martinez, a KRNV weatherman, was just outside the air race grounds at the time of the crash. He said he saw the plane veer to the right and then "it just augered straight into the ground."

"You saw pieces and parts going everywhere," he said. "Everyone is in disbelief."

The National Championship Air Races draws thousands of people every year in September to watch various military and civilian planes race.

The races have attracted scrutiny in the past over safety concerns, including four pilots killed in 2007 and 2008. It was such a concern that local school officials once considered whether they should not allow student field trips at the event.

The competition is like a car race in the sky, with planes flying wingtip-to-wingtip as low as 50 feet off the sagebrush at speeds sometimes surpassing 500 mph. Pilots follow an oval path around pylons, with distances and speeds depending on the class of aircraft.

Video here.... can't see much close up, but it looks bad............

[Little Texan]

I've never been to an air show, and from what I've seen on the news over the years, I never want to go to one, either, as it seems there is a crash at every one of them.

[sadaist]

$10 bucks says someone who died was yet another VH fan that will never have the opportunity to unwrap & play a new Van Halen album. Good going Eddie...you ass.

Thoughts to all involved & their friends and family. I truly hope any casualty numbers stay very very low.

[FORD]

Yeah, my parents live about 2 miles east of the Olympia Airport, and sometimes I get a little nervous if I'm out there with all these old planes flying pretty low over their house. In this case, I think it was a combination of old plane AND old pilot. Both were about 80. And now, both are dead, along with a dozen or so others, according to the Reno TV channel.

[SunisinuS]

I was feted for my birthday with a trip to Reno. Was a tradition. As a pilot and a fan my heart goes out to all those hurt and for everyone there. Tragedy.

I have been around airplanes whenever I could my whole life. I have tremendous respect for their abilities and their lethality. I have sat in those very same stands where the video was shot.

[Seshmeister]

I don't mean to sound cold but there have been so many of these things now at air shows if you do get killed you can't really complain about it.

I would never go anywhere near one of these things.

[Nitro Express]

We were at Reno the year this happened. The owner of the P-51 was a family friend. It was a very cool plane. Counter rotating props and loud as hell when it fired up. Luckily the guy flying survived the crash and is still flying today.

[Blaze]

I don't know , Ford. I was a CAP and an Aviation Explorer, part of that was hosting an Air Show. We never had any deaths. There are 1000's of Air Shows, but the one that make the news are the one that give death to the ratings thirsty.
Cheers!

[Nitro Express]

I was at this Thunderbird show at Mountain Home air force base and saw one of the Thunderbirds crash his plane. These are experienced highly trained pilots but he forgot to reset his altimeter and it was still set for the runway in California that they flew in from. Whoops! A big fucking expensive mistake!

[Nitro Express]

[PETE'S BROTHER]

what? they don't automatically "reset"?

[Nitro Express]

what? they don't automatically "reset"?

Nope. The one in the plane I fly has a little knob you turn to set the altimeter for the elevation of the runway you are going to land at. It's call flight prep and what seems mundane and repetitive may save your life. I'm amazed he forgot to do it. He must have tossed the checklist.

[SunisinuS]

Nope. The one in the plane I fly has a little knob you turn to set the altimeter for the elevation of the runway you are going to land at. It's call flight prep and what seems mundane and repetitive may save your life. I'm amazed he forgot to do it. He must have tossed the checklist.

Kudo to a fellow pilot. Cherokee 6528Charlie says hello.

[PETE'S BROTHER]

hola from whiskey tango bravo 420

[SunisinuS]

lol Nice Orion. Man the whole cavalier shit is so military. Everyday is a good day to die! Was fun watching this crew...thanks nitro.

Gotta love the hula gal. Think I will have to add her to my flight collective. For those that watch this video, at :49 you will see how I used to pass beers back to the people in the back seat as we flew on our way to a Grateful Dead Concert. Let it float out of my hand and then push the nose back down and watch it gracefully travel back to the person that needed one. Me I was flying...so no beer for the pilot. Only for the drummer when I was back on the ground. It was also how I used to pass the boombox after starting My Tunes in it. Lol this huge boombox would float back over the headrest and just float down in their lap. Comedy.

Roth On!

[Nitro Express]

It doesn't concern me how old the plane is so much. An airframe can pretty much last forever as long as it's maintained. Look at the B-52's still flying and will fly until the middle of this century. To keep a plane FAA certified requires going over everything. Most crashes are the result of pilot error. I've seen people do some stupid shit. I've seen too many people load up a small plane with people and luggage and then try to take off on a hot day. They stall the plane and crash. I've seen people take off without topping their tanks off thinking they can make it to the destination and then they run into a headwind. A friend of mine ran out of fuel on final approach and plowed through a barbed wire fence. He was in a hurry to get home and didn't want to mess with waiting for the fuel truck. If you are going 150 miles you can get there faster just driving. By the time you do your pre flight check, top the tanks off, warm up the engine, taxi and takeoff you are well on your way in a car. Then you have to land, find a tie down spot (getting expensive these days) and rent a car. In a small plane if bad weather rolls in you are grounded because you can't get above it. Small planes are just glorified toys and not serious transportation. Unless you can get up above the weather you are seriously handicapped.

[Nitro Express]

I grew up in central Idaho so I'm used to landing on some scary airstrips. We had quite a few bush pilots in our town including my dad.

[SunisinuS]

I have my mountain checkout. All you have to do is to check and follow the charts, communicate, ask locals. Speak! Listen for that stall horn! Look for deer and the rabbits following them. hehe. Courtesy car baby...then you just take a tarp and drape it over the wing. Camping camping campin. Lewiston was part of my cross country solo. Walla Walla.

Tell your dad if he is still kicking hello.


Went up to CDL just to go golfing for the weekend with two buddies. Got fogged in.....didn't get out until Monday right before classes.

My neck of the woods Currently:




This one is a pilot killer for those who do not know the area.

[Nitro Express]

lol Nice Orion. Man the whole cavalier shit is so military. Everyday is a good day to die! Was fun watching this crew...thanks nitro.

Gotta love the hula gal. Think I will have to add her to my flight collective. For those that watch this video, at :49 you will see how I used to pass beers back to the people in the back seat as we flew on our way to a Grateful Dead Concert. Let it float out of my hand and then push the nose back down and watch it gracefully travel back to the person that needed one. Me I was flying...so no beer for the pilot. Only for the drummer when I was back on the ground. It was also how I used to pass the boombox after starting My Tunes in it. Lol this huge boombox would float back over the headrest and just float down in their lap. Comedy.

Roth On!

Glad you liked it. It's the Marines flying the Blue Angel's transport plane. Flying by the numbers to say the least. Grateful Dead? Were you flying one of these with wings?

[SunisinuS]

It's all in the takeoff baby...without that...there would be no landing.



Let me roll up on the sidewalk and take a look!

[Nitro Express]

I have my mountain checkout. All you have to do is to check and follow the charts, communicate, ask locals. Speak! Listen for that stall horn! Look for deer and the rabbits following them. hehe. Courtesy car baby...then you just take a tarp and drape it over the wing. Camping camping campin. Lewiston was part of my cross country solo. Walla Walla.

Tell your dad if he is still kicking hello.


Went up to CDL just to go golfing for the weekend with two buddies. Got fogged in.....didn't get out until Monday right before classes.

My neck of the woods Currently:




This one is a pilot killer for those who do not know the area.

We used to have a cabin not too far from an old forrest service strip. My dad put in a windsock and we used it. Then at the cabin we had an old Willie's Jeep we would bring up for the summer. Man, I was always scared that old Jeep would break down and leave us stranded but it never did. The horn was just a piece of wire on the steering wheel hub and it would shoot sparks all over the place if you honked the horn. Some good memories there. I remember if we had a plane full of people he would wait until right before sunset to take off to take advantage of the cold air so we could miss the big ass mountain at the end of the runway. Fun but scary at times. What scared the shit out of people that never flew with us before was the signal going off from the end of runway beacon flying into our home airport. That thing was loud as hell and would make the unnacustomed shit their pants thinking it was an engine alarm or something. Most my friends dads had their pilots licenses. Different times. If you were middle class you could have a plane and boat in those days.

[Nitro Express]

It's all in the takeoff baby...without that...there would be no landing.



Let me roll up on the sidewalk and take a look!

If you have some good acid man yeah you deffinately can take off. Sometimes those landings are rough though.

[SunisinuS]

Yea. Man Yea. Times are always going forward. The sports license now. All I can hope for now is a personal amphibious X plane that I can fly off of John Denver's ashes. I will not stop though. So like you and your dad.....we will continue to fly. Period.

[Nitro Express]

http://youtu.be/QsgiEubacT0

Every now and then I will see Harrison Ford's DeHavilland flying above the valley here.

[Nitro Express]

Yea. Man Yea. Times are always going forward. The sports license now. All I can hope for now is a personal amphibious X plane that I can fly off of John Denver's ashes. I will not stop though. So like you and your dad.....we will continue to fly. Period.

The real flying junky is my brother in law. He's been a commercial pilot for about 30 years. He's flying for Delta now. If he's not flying for work he is flying some kind of cool small plane. He flys everyday whether it's for work or fun. I will be flying and we will be going up and down and I turn the yoke over to him and it's dead steady. He makes it look easy.

[PETE'S BROTHER]

http://news.yahoo.com/3-dead-56-inju...020656982.htmlhttp://http://news.yahoo.com/3-dead-...020656982.html

[SunisinuS]

You know that this is the nation recognized for doing flight...Wright?


So even when the world hurts....and the chances we take seem to be leading towards death.....without Flight....where would this country be?

[Nitro Express]

Kudo to a fellow pilot. Cherokee 6528Charlie says hello.

I spent many hours in a Piper Cherokee myself. Kind of gave the tail end some gravel rash from landing it on gravel runways though. I'm flying a Mooney now. Too nice to land on gravel and oh yes retractable gear is nice unless you forget to put it down. Got to have that on the checklist. LOL!

[Nitro Express]

You know that this is the nation recognized for doing flight...Wright?


So even when the world hurts....and the chances we take seem to be leading towards death.....without Flight....where would this country be?

What amazes me about the Wright Brothers is modern technicians and engineers try to recreate their planes and what they did and always end up failing. They can't do it as well as the Wright Brothers did. Also, that simple wing lift mechanism they designed is very accurate. You don't realize how gifted and brilliant those guys were until people today try to copy what they did.

[SunisinuS]

I spent many hours in a Piper Cherokee myself. Kind of gave the tail end some gravel rash from landing it on gravel runways though. I'm flying a Mooney now. Too nice to land on gravel and oh yes retractable gear is nice unless you forget to put it down. Got to have that on the checklist. LOL!

Envious of the Mooney. Sweet sliding well designed airplane. Please always do your checklist and fear the weather ok?

[Nitro Express]

http://news.yahoo.com/3-dead-56-inju...020656982.htmlhttp://http://news.yahoo.com/3-dead-...020656982.html

It's too bad it crashed into the crowd. I know when the Blue Angels did an air show in Idaho Falls they closed off I-15 and used it as a safe corridor to fly over. In Seattle as Sea Fair they always fly over Lake Washington. Things happen and planes crash. The most dangerous place to be in an airplane is close to the ground because you have very little time to do anything. It's always thrilling to see a plane fly fast and low overhead or come for the stands low and fast and then pull up but if you lose an engine or have control problems you go into the crowd.

[Nitro Express]

Envious of the Mooney. Sweet sliding well designed airplane. Please always do your checklist and fear the weather ok?

You sound like my dad. Flying is like scuba diving. It's too easy to kill yourself if you do one little thing wrong. I'm a completely different person in the cockpit. I'm more serious than I normally am. People recognize that right off. Especially when you have passengers. It's one thing to kill yourself but it's a whole other thing to kill others and be responsible for that and know they will blame your family for it and all that. So yeah, I'm careful.

Mooneys are so fast for what they are. Very slick planes. Not the best plane for beginners that's for damn sure.

[SunisinuS]

N.A.U.I. and P.A.D.I. II open water myself. So is my sister. Tough People we.


i can get air tanks accross the globe.


I used to take out air ashes for people. I would give them the flight where they could pour out their loved one's ashes.

They would never listen to the airflow.

So I would have to wash the ashes off the airplane with a hose, so clean their loved ones off the right side.

Down the Drain.

It is not easy being a pilot.

[Nitro Express]

My brother in law didn't have 20/20 vision so he couldn't be a military pilot. His goal was to be a commercial pilot. He worked as a gopher at a small airport in exchange for pilot's lessons and then he started to fly charter air on small shoe string airlines. Man he can tell some funny and horrifying stories. He would fly out of Las Vegas and take people over the Grand Canyon or he might fly some wetbacks back to Mexico. Then he finally got hired by Northwest Orient and flew 747 400's to Asia and back. He actually had corrective contacts that reshaped his eye lens to improve his vision and now with surgery they can improve your vision. But he did all this at a time when there were always ex military pilots to compete with. Now he's flying an Airbus and is going to Europe. He's used to four engines over the drink and he says when he looks at the throttle bank and then all the water ahead he gets nervous with only two. He doesn't dig the Airbus. He hates having no manual backup to the computerized fly by wire system. He absolutely hates the steering wheel for taxiing the plane. He says you barely turn the thing and the plane whips around too much. He says it a bigger fucking pain to taxi the damn thing than to fly it. LOL!

[Nitro Express]

"You can pull her off anytime you wish captain." The comments from the tower crack me up every time I watch this. Ivan is probably shitting himself wondering why the plane isn't lifting off like it does in ice cold Siberia. LOL!

[fifth element]

I don't know , Ford. I was a CAP and an Aviation Explorer, part of that was hosting an Air Show. We never had any deaths. There are 1000's of Air Shows, but the one that make the news are the one that give death to the ratings thirsty.
Cheers!

thank you Blaze.

It is like anything else...shark attacks, cars, trains, and most of what goes on in life. We don't hear reports if everything is calm and cool, or while things go well....

Let something go wrong, however, and it will make the news, the papers and the internet in seconds.

[BITEYOASS]

I've been to many airshows and will continue to attend them. Being in Iraq and having aircraft fly less than 100 ft over me is what eliminates my fear of airshows.

[Nitro Express]

I've been to many airshows and will continue to attend them. Being in Iraq and having aircraft fly less than 100 ft over me is what eliminates my fear of airshows.

We are just bags of water existing in a world full of sharp corners. If you are scared of dying then you will never do anything or leave the house and then you will die slipping on a bar of soap in the shower.

[LoungeMachine]

One of the spectators killed on the ground was the best friend of a musician buddy of mine.



RIP Greg Morcom

[Diamondjimi]

Sorry to hear that Lounge. I wonder why they don't have these events over water?