On the night of Oct. 24, some 40,000 filled War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock as WSU's substitutes and undersized first-year players took the field. USA, McPherson, Lewis leg was so badly damaged, his foot was hanging sideways. We were just down. And he'd slip up every now and then," she recalls, "and say something very touching. The WSU tragedy prompted a thorough government investigation of FAA regulations for charter flights. She wanted to more about the events and how they affected her They Valory would pray to her father every night. Wichita State crash still echoes 1970 accident killed He didn't like flying much and was in the habit of picking up a little something at the airport -- Dramamine, if they had it -- and dozing through flights. "I have relived that crash so often," Diane says. Because he had flash burns on his He went to Evansville, Indiana, several times with Wichita She did all of it without ever setting foot inside his dorm room (school rules, team rules). So instead of quitting school, Diane had Valory and returned to WSU, with one of her sisters helping her out with the baby. The slow speed resulted in eleven passengers surviving the crash, but twenty-nine died on impact and another two succumbed to wounds afterward. We have set your language to Wichita State University held a memorial service at Cessna Stadium on Friday honoring both the victims and survivors of a plane crash 50 years ago. It was such a monumental thing that happened in our All the girls loved him. His trip to the cockpit had saved his life. Please enter your email and password to sign in. "There were no announcements that we were in trouble that Please enter your email address and we will send you an email with a reset password code. Maxwell On Dec. 23, Emily and her dad got in a few runs on the bunny slope. Nine people survived the crash. Resend Activation Email. He was thrown onto a pile of mangled mess. The audience will be seated on the west side of the stadium. These men that survived are all getting up in Fifty years ago Friday. Dickinson County, seen flickers of smoke and fire. sometimes a need, to keep the story alive. But Featherstone has a particular mission. Kansas, Please reset your password. As we walked down the hill, a fireball swept through the plane and Minutes after the crash, with a compound fracture of his leg, he regained consciousness outside the burned airplane, roused by a rescuer who'd been working on the Eisenhower Tunnel less than 2 miles away. Paul and Kelly Harrison help plane crash survivor Rick Stephens hike up the steep Rocky Mountain grade to the site of the Wichita State University football team plane crash Stephens survived 50 years ago. After graduating with a degree in nursing from WSU, Valory would work for a year in Wichita before eventually moving to Kansas City, Missouri. A memorial service will be staged in Cessna Stadium, which has remained even though Wichita State dropped football in 1987. Charles O. Miller, director of the Bureau of Aviation Safety, arrived at the scene Saturday, along with FAA representatives. Like everyone else, he was cut and burned. Not only were they just great young men, friendly to everyone, and amazing athletes, they also were too young to die while they had so much to offer.. There was a problem getting your location. Batman, a 2020 graduate who majored in communication, started her work on the plane Greenwood County, It was both a wry prophecy and a tribute to her late father, whom she seemed to favor. The Wichita Eagle, pp A10, A12. comfortable being able to talk about it, Lutz said. USA, Plot info: Addition 1, Block 27, Lot 9, Space 5. The brotherhood that I witnessed as a result Survivors and family members of the crash victims attended the service. One plane crashed near Silver Plume, Colorado. Guys we lost who didnt get to live their lives. through their work. "So my whole family got tested." You can customize the cemeteries you volunteer for by selecting or deselecting below. He was excited: The coaches had told Mal that after two seasons as the team's long snapper, he'd be starting at center on Saturday. USA, Clinton, Why? It was the Wichita lineman's last secret. She vowed to avoid any undo exertion, to stay off the black diamond runs and to ski only with her father. "I honor their memory every day," Lewis said. Illinois, Traveling in . Custer County, A reception will be held on the stadium concourse, then later in the day are planned screenings of short documentaries filmed about the crash. Get out of here.". the pilots. The two would marry, move to Nixa, Missouri, and have four children. Stephens says he heard Crocker ask Skipper how high the mountain ahead of them was. Today, a memorial below the crash site on Interstate 70 commemorates the tragedy, and the FAA has gone on to pass stricter regulations with each passing year. Twenty-three others would follow shortly, most directed against Golden Eagle Aviation and the Jack Richards Aircraft Company. Illinois, It scares me that, one day, people wont ", Her family wanted her close to a major hospital while she took it easy. When the door opened to their floor, she staggered out, breathing heavily, before collapsing onto the carpet. Arkansas, Pat Graham, Forgotten Tragedy: Survivors Quest to Keep Memories of 1970 Wichita State Crash from Fading, Associated Press, September 26, 2010. Oklahoma, his 2005 interview with Lutz. Marshall resumed football after a crash that Suits were also pending in federal court on grounds that the FAA erroneously certified the plane as airworthy. "I was honestly kind of surprised she went," Perryman said, "but I get it.". get choked up at moments and he held back tears.. While we mourn those we lost that day, we also focus on those who survived the crash. Oct. 2, 1970. Twelve survivors staggered or were carried to the highway, where ambulances rushed them to Idaho Springs. The profound sadness we feel as a community Featherstones family eventually moved into the country, and he spent his final two seasons of high school at Edmond Memorial. Bob Renner was recorded to have been in the wreckage the longest. The Gold Plane's first officer, Ronald Skipper, had a different idea. Because just six weeks later, a Southern Airways DC-9 carrying Marshall University's football team never made it to the runway during its final descent, killing all 75 passengers and crew on board and forming the basis for the 2006 feature film "We Are Marshall," starring Matthew McConaughey. A cardiac MRI showed that the right ventricle of Emily's heart had near-catastrophic scarring. All our clothes had been blown off or torn off, and I was buried up to my chest in There was no blue sky visible out the windows of the cockpit, only the green and brown of the surrounding terrain. The survivors are getting older. There was never a cross word said between us.. The passengers enjoyed the aerial view of the changing autumn leaves, with the village of Georgetown gleaming below. memorial ceremony a poignant reminder for the many people who attended or worked at He heard people moaning from inside the plane, but it They were bound for Logan, Utah, to play the Utah State University Aggies the following day. It has changed me in subtle ways, he said. Survivors Wichita State athleticsthrough his GoShockers.com blog. APRIL 30 NEW KICKER PLAN The Cowboys had their eyes on kickers in this NFL Draft, maybe especially Jake Moody, the All-American from Michigan (naturally, given what Dallas did with its first two . To get plenty of manpower to Utah, WSU chartered two planes and crews from Oklahoma City-based Golden Eagle Aviation Company, with each plane holding some forty people. He still would This account has been disabled. She would finally retire as a professor in the MSU Education Department after the pandemic-altered spring semester in 2020, to the house in Nixa she shares with her husband, just across a horse pasture from Valory and her family. On Friday, October 2, 1970, a pair of Martin 404 twin-engine aircraft took off from Wichita, Kansas, carrying the Wichita State University (WSU) football team, coaches, and VIP supporters. Has won three Sports Emmys and six Edward R. Murrow Awards, as well as a Prism, a Gracie, and a National Headliner Award. A couple flying from Florida to Georgia have been identified as two people who died in a plane crash Wednesday. "Mom, I'm alive -- it's a miracle," one player would say into a pay phone. Only one of those would never get to meet her father. The inspection revealed sixteen distinct mechanical failures, including oil leaks in both engines, hydraulic fluid leaks, and an arcing battery cable. Please complete the captcha to let us know you are a real person. The second craft headed straight west out of Denver toward the mountains. State and went to Marshall University (in West Virginia) as part of the Kansas State I jumped off the top of the plane to the ground. [18] A trail to the wreck site via Dry Gulch is 0.4 miles past the memorial off exit 216. The stories depended on those memories and a willingness, In 2016, Lewis wrote an essay for The Eagle titled This tragedy did not define me.. A list of the 31 people killed in the Wichita State football plane crash on Oct. 2, 1970. She had ARVC, a rare heart condition linked to multiple cases of sudden death in young athletes immediately after intense physical activity -- a condition usually undiagnosed until their autopsies. What No. Valory, who preferred cheerleading to competitive athletics, always wanted to know what Mal had been like: "Depending on what was happening in my life, it would kind of prompt a question, like, 'Did he play sports?'". Mal's parents thought she should come home to Ste. Today, wreckage from the crash remains on the slope of Mt. So Lewis called his mother at work back in Duncan. I got up behind the cockpit area and I could hear some concerned conversation between In 1977 WSU was found liable for not carrying adequate insurance on the passengers. I wish it had been a cathartic process for those guys, but I always felt their pain. I wasnt only a Shocker beat writer, I was a Shocker alum.. wrote and reported The Pieces That Remain: Remembering the Wichita State Plane Crash in 2016 for KMUW. (2000, October 1). USA, Ann Arbor, Fifty years later, looking back on her days working in the psychology office, Diane Buatte would say, "That job probably saved my life.".
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