Wednesday's Tanker Crash Double Tragedy For Pilots' Family | Aero-News Network
Aero-News Network
RSS icon RSS feed
podcast icon MP3 podcast
Subscribe Aero-News e-mail Newsletter Subscribe

Airborne Unlimited -- Most Recent Daily Episodes

Episode Date

Airborne-Monday

Airborne-Tuesday

Airborne-Wednesday Airborne-Thursday

Airborne-Friday

Airborne On YouTube

Airborne-Unlimited-06.23.25

Airborne-NextGen-06.24.25

AirborneUnlimited-06.25.25

Airborne-AffordableFlyers-06.26.25

AirborneUnlimited-06.27.25

Fri, Apr 22, 2005

Wednesday's Tanker Crash Double Tragedy For Pilots' Family

One Pilot's Brother Died In 1995 Tanker Mishap

Wednesday's crash of a firefighting tanker in northern California was a double tragedy for the family pilot Paul Cockrell. You see, Paul's brother died in a 1995 mid-air while fighting a forest fire in the Anza-Borrego State Park, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Gary Cockrell was at the controls of an Aero Union P-3 when his aircraft collided with a Beechcraft spotter plane also working the Anza-Borrego fire. Cockrell, copilot Lisa Netsch and the pilot of the Beech, Michael Smith, were all killed in the mishap.

Witnesses said Smith's spotter plane appeared to impact the upper fuselage of the P-3, shearing away the vertical stabilizer. Even with their aircraft heavily damaged and going down, Cockrell and Netsch were credited with maneuvering to avoid a tract of homes in their way.

Before Wednesday, it was the last aviation accident involving an aircraft flying for Aero Union.

FMI: www.aerounion.com

Advertisement

More News

NTSB Final Report: Rutan Long-EZ

He Attempted To Restart The Engine Three Times. On The Third Restart Attempt, He Noticed That Flames Were Coming Out From The Right Wing Near The Fuel Cap Analysis: The pilot repor>[...]

ANN FAQ: Turn On Post Notifications

Make Sure You NEVER Miss A New Story From Aero-News Network Do you ever feel like you never see posts from a certain person or page on Facebook or Instagram? Here’s how you c>[...]

Classic Aero-TV: ICAS Perspectives - Advice for New Air Show Performers

From 2009 (YouTube Edition): Leading Air Show Performers Give Their Best Advice for Newcomers On December 6th through December 9th, the Paris Las Vegas Hotel hosted over 1,500 air >[...]

ANN's Daily Aero-Linx (06.28.25)

Aero Linx: NASA ASRS ASRS captures confidential reports, analyzes the resulting aviation safety data, and disseminates vital information to the aviation community. The ASRS is an i>[...]

Aero-News: Quote of the Day (06.28.25)

“For our inaugural Pylon Racing Seminar in Roswell, we were thrilled to certify 60 pilots across our six closed-course pylon race classes. Not only did this year’s PRS >[...]

blog comments powered by Disqus



Advertisement

Advertisement

Podcasts

Advertisement

© 2007 - 2025 Web Development & Design by Pauli Systems, LC