RENO, Nev. – The Second World War plane that killed at least nine people crash-landed like a missile on the Reno tarmac, coming straight down on VIP box seats to carve out a large crater.
The 1940s-model plane left a crater 1 metre deep by 2.4 metres wide, close to the grandstand where thousands were watching Friday as the planes sped overhead.
The P-51 Mustang dubbed The Galloping Ghost appeared to lose a piece of its tail before the crash, killing pilot Jimmy Leeward, and eight spectators. So far, two of the spectators have been identified.
Officials said 69 people were treated at hospitals, including 36 who have been released and 31 who remain there. Nine were in critical condition late Saturday.
Doctors who treated the injured said it was among the most severe situations they had ever seen because of the large number of people.
“I’ve seen more patients, but never this many patients with this number of severe injuries,” added Dr. Michael Morkin, chief of Renown’s emergency department, who trained at Cook County General Hospital In Chicago. “It was traumatic.”
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Injuries included major head wounds, facial trauma and limb injuries, including amputations, said Dr. Myron Gomes, chief trauma surgeon at Renown Regional Medical Center.
National Transportation Safety Board officials were on the scene Saturday to determine what caused Leeward to lose control of the plane, and they were looking at amateur video clips that appeared to show a small piece of the aircraft falling to the ground before the crash.
Reno police also provided a GPS mapping system to help investigators recreate the crash scene.
“Pictures and video appear to show a piece of the plane was coming off,” NTSB spokesman Mark Rosekind said at a news conference. “A component has been recovered. We have not identified the component or if it even came from the airplane … We are going to focus on that.”
Investigators said they also recovered part of the tail section, where the tab is located.
One of the things investigators will be looking at is the health of Leeward, the 74-year-old pilot, who friends say was in excellent health.
The crash marked the first time spectators had been killed since the races began 47 years ago in Reno. Twenty pilots including Leeward have died in that time, race officials said.
The disaster prompted renewed calls for race organizers to consider ending the event because of the dangers.
The Reno air race is the only one its kind in the United States. Planes at the yearly event fly wingtip-to-wingtip as low as 16 metres off the ground at speeds sometimes surpassing 800 kilometres an hour. Pilots follow an oval path around pylons, with distances and speeds depending on the class of aircraft.
Another airshow crash came Saturday in Martinsburg, W.V., when a post-Second War plane, a T-28, crashed and burst into flames. The pilot was killed.
Leeward, the owner of the Leeward Air Ranch Racing Team, was a well-known racing pilot. His website says he has flown more than 120 races and served as a stunt pilot for numerous movies.
In an interview last year, Leeward described how he has flown 250 types of planes and has a particular fondness for the P-51, which came into the Second World War relatively late and was used as a long-range bomber escort over Europe.
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