C182 May Have Lost Power On Takeoff

The pilot of a Cessna 182L was slightly injured when his aircraft came to rest inverted in the backyards of two homes near Bowman Field (LOU) in Louisville, KY Wednesday morning.

Local officials say the plane's engine lost power shortly after takeoff from LOU.

WAVE-3 reports the pilot was able to free himself from the wreckage. No one on the ground was injured, although residents were briefly evacuated while fire department officials determined whether any fuel was leaking from the plane.

Things could have been far worse. Witnesses say the plane barely missed power lines, and not a drop of fuel spilled from the plane's full tanks.

"I heard a thud, and at first I got the impression that a couple cars had crashed or somebody maybe hit a parked car," said Dave Young, who lives two doors down from the accident site. But it wasn't anything that really made me roll out of bed -- I thought it may have been down on I-64.

"And then I heard an ambulance, and I got up immediately, and as I came out they were loading the pilot on a gurney into an ambulance and evacuating everybody on the block."

Young says he's lived near the airport for close to 50 years, and had never seen an accident until recently. Wednesday's crash was the second near the airport in the past month; a Cessna P210N impacted near the field April 6, while trying to land at LOU.

"You think about, you know, being so close to the airport -- we've been here 47 years -- and it never happened before," Young said. "It's pretty frightening, actually."

FMI: www.faa.gov