Mon, Oct 25, 2004
Tragedy Strikes Highly-Regarded NASCAR Team
By ANN Senior Correspondent Kevin O'Brien
A Beech King Air 200 (file photo, below, right) owned by the
Hendrick Motorsports organization crashed enroute to Martinsville,
Virginia Sunday afternoon, killing all ten on board, including the
two pilots, Dick Tracy and Kim Morrison; NASCAR driver Tony
Stewart's pilot, Scott Latham; and seven members of the Hendrick
organization or Hendrick family. The mishap flight originated in
Charlotte, NC and crashed in high terrain seven miles west of
KMTV.
The aircraft was
reported overdue and missing during the race. Hendrick team driver
Jimmie Johnson won the race and learned of the accident only after
finishing. He was excused from the winner's circle, and NASCAR and
police spread a protective cloak of security over the team in
Martinsville and at its headquarters in Charlotte, other team
members, and patriarch Rick Hendrick, who was not on board the
ill-fated flight. He lost his son Ricky, his brother John,
and his nieces Jennifer and Kimberly, John's twin daughters, along
with team employees Joe Jackson, Jeff Turner and Randy Dorton.
NTSB officials will begin their investigation Monday morning. It
is far too early to speculate as to the possible cause of the
accident, but they will certainly look hard at the weather, which
the Martinsville ASOS was reporting as below minimums before and at
the time of the accident. (Non-aviator readers should be advised
that pilots generally do not have much trust in the automated
ASOS's reporting of minimums -- it only looks at one point in the
sky, straight up, and cloud bottoms aren't usually completely
even). The flight was conducted under 14 CFR Part 91 and the
airplane was not required to have flight or data recorders.
This is Hendrick's 20th year in the Nextel (formerly Winston)
Cup Series, NASCAR's top competition; they field four Nextel Cup
competitors, and others in the minor-league Busch and truck racing
series.
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