Plane plunges into sewage tank, disappears

Shoki, one of the three that were killed was one of my fellow CFI's at my
FBO. While I only knew him in the day-to-day operations at our FBO, he was
always one of the warmest and friendliest person you could hope to meet.
The day he and his students died in that incredulously tragic crash I found
myself trying to reconcile that I had just seen him earlier that day,
walking by my desk in the CFI office area, smiling and waving as he always
would as he went off to his flight instruction duties.

The day after the accident all the CFI's met at the FBO, although none of us
had any desire to fly; both out of respect for our fallen friend and because
we were distracted by the loss of three of our own and were just not fit to
fly.

We hung around at the FBO for many hours (after an early morning meeting
where the announcement was shared - we were told to feel free to
decline/cancel any flights and to respect the wishes of any of our students
that were not up to flying that day). The thoughts we shared went back and
forth between the ones lost and the 'what could have gone wrong'
discussions.

The site of the accident was around the practice area that most of us visit
regularly with our students. The uncanny 'accuracy' (for lack of a better
word) that the plane went down into the sewage pond was dumbfounding. Of
course, the cruel irony of meeting one's end in a raw sewage pond made the
tragedy seem all the more poignant. They had to use a high pressure hose
with heavily chlorinated water to wash of the aircraft wreckage and the
bodies before copter lifting the wreckage (along with the bodies - secured
in by tarps and ropes) out of the emptied sewage pond and then set down on a
clear area nearby.

The wreckage was taken to Sacramento for study and the bodies were take to
the coroner.

One of our CFI's had been flying by the area and saw an aircraft spinning
in, but she had said that she was so high and the plane so low, that it
looked almost like a model radio airplane. It was after she landed that she
realized what she had just witnessed. Shoki had been one of her very close
friends at the flight school.

I didn't know the students very well, although I obviously knew them by
sight, in the day-to-day operations of the FBO.

I had been told years ago that if you fly long enough you will eventually
know someone who dies. Although another nearby business lost their owner in
a plane accident, this is the first time that this kind of tragedy has
struck in the 'home nest', as it were.

I took one of my students up for a flight yesterday and although the mood to
the aircraft was a somber one, talking about the loss - once we were in the
air, we both did what we had to do and focused our minds on the task.

There had been so many posts on this thread (which I wouldn't have noticed
until a friend mentioned the thread on this newsgroup; usually I'm just on
RAS), I just felt it important to put a human side, personal account of the
loss my flight school has gone through. There are three burning candles
with offerings of flowers on our front desk, commemorating the loss.

This was a profound loss that will be felt for some time.


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Good Flights!

Cecil E. Chapman
CFI-A, CP-ASEL-IA

Check out my personal flying adventures from my first flight to the
checkride AND the continuing adventures beyond!
Complete with pictures and text at: www.bayareapilot.com

"I fly because it releases my mind from the tyranny of petty things."
- Antoine de Saint-Exupery -

"We who fly, do so for the love of flying. We are alive in the air with
this miracle that lies in our hands and beneath our feet"
- Cecil Day Lewis -