A Robinson R44 and an R22 crashed at 3:30 Thursday afternoon. The R44
contained a flight instructor and student taking the Robinson safety
course in the 4 place. The R22 had a student making his first
supervised solo. Amazingly, the crash occured right in front of the
control tower. The student in the R22 apparently started a descending
left turn and the R44 was taking off. I guess the student could not
see what was directly below him and vice versa. I don't know what the
people in the tower were doing. Maybe one of the pilots was not
following an instruction and it happened too quickly for the tower to
stop it. The Robinson factory, as many of you know, is right on the
field.
Both in the R44 were killed as the helicopter rotated about 4 times as
it came down on the runway and burst into flames. The student in the
R22 was taken to the hospital in critical contition, but speaking.
His helicopter made a softer landing in the corn field that shares the
airport. There was no fire for his.
The airport was closed all that night as the R44 crashed onto 29L and
they were cleaning it up last night. The airport opened at 7am but
only 29R. 29L remains closed.