Adventure at ParaStars

by George Hawkins

June 20, 2002

Mid-morning Sunday, June 8, 2002 provided some adventure for the ParaStars. 

Parking, spectating, loading, and unloading, all occur at the south side of the field (the picture at right looks SW).  Looking north at the field, to the left is a road, lined with trees and relatively low power lines.  The wind was from the right, so takeoffs were going away from the power lines, with wide-open spaces in that direction.

Suddenly, we saw a private plane coming in very low, parallel to the road.  About the time it was even with our ‘strip’, it started a turn toward us!  The plane went a little past us and came in toward the field.  We realized that it was coming in without power.

Terry Alford had just landed, having come in over the power lines, and his wing was still up, as if to do a touch and go.  A couple of other pilots were on a landing approach, as well.  The plane was coming from behind and from Terry’s left, and looked to be heading on a collision course if Terry decided to power up and go again.  Fortunately, the pilot brought the plane down very skillfully on the rather uneven ground, stopping about 100 feet from Terry.  There were no injuries and no damage to the plane.

The pilot and his partner (pictured left), a passenger, had just bought the plane, a 1962 Mooney M20C, the day before, and had taken off from Sebring airport about 45 minutes earlier en route to Atlanta.  The plane had been involved in another engine-out situation a few months earlier, but had been checked out thoroughly and cleared for flight.  The prior diagnosis, after the mechanics had found nothing wrong, was listed as carb icing.  The pilot knew that not to be the case this time, as he was flying at a higher power setting and the day was not as humid as we normally have in the area.

Because the pilot had radioed in on the emergency frequency, trying to locate an airport, the FAA came out to investigate.  The FAA had the local sheriff’s office, who arrived at the field with five units and an emergency vehicle, detain the pilot until the FAA could get there.  This took about two hours, but the FAA guy did his job politely and with a minimum of fuss, in about 30 minutes.  The poor FAA guy had investigated several crashes in the prior few days.  There was one guy who crashed a helicopter one afternoon but wasn’t injured.  Then, the next morning, he took a Cessna 172 up and dived in at about an 80 degree angle.  Also, a banner plane had dropped its banner and then crashed, killing the pilot.  That occurred just a couple of miles from the ParaStars field, only two or three days prior to the emergency landing by the Mooney, and the FAA guy had investigated all of them.  He was very glad this one did not involve a fatality.

1. left to right, Doug
Turner, the pilot; Paul, the FAA guy; and George, the author.
2. There's still plenty of room to launch around it.
No damage was done in the emergency landing.