Money-Hungry Lakeland Seeking More Than $16K For Damages

The City of Lakeland, FL has filed suit against pilot Terry Edward Morris, who overturned his modified Glasair III (below) while attempting to land at Lakeland Linder Regional Airport on April 18, 2004 while participating in the annual Sun 'n Fun airshow.

City Attorney Tim McCausland told the Lakeland Ledger newspaper the city was suing Morris for the cost of cleaning up the accident scene, including digging up soil contaminated by spilled avgas, and of replacing a taxiway light taken out by the plane.

All told, according to Lakeland officials, the costs come out to $16,283.44.

The city is justifying its suit against Morris based, in part, on the NTSB Probable Cause report on the accident. The report states the mishap was caused by the pilot's failure to maintain airspeed and altitude while performing an attempted go-around, with a contributing factor being Morris's failure to follow ATC instruction.

According to the NTSB report and a story reported in Aero-News, Morris misunderstood an ATC clearance directing him to land on runway 9L, instead of 9R as he had assumed. While attempting to sidestep over to the correct runway at 200 ft. MSL, the plane nearly stalled; while attempting to recover, the Glasair's landing gear caught the right edge of 9L, causing the plane to roll off the edge of the runway and flip over. 

Lakeland's suit claims Morris was negligent in attempting to land on the wrong runway.

In the NTSB report, Morris told investigators he had landed on 9R six times prior to the accident, and that he did not initially realize that ATC instructions directing a "white low wing" aircraft to land on 9L were for him.

Morris was unavailable for comment. Lakeland Assistant Attorney Palmer Davis told the Ledger the pilot had not responded to letters from the city prior to the suit being filed.

Editor-In-Chief Note: It has been well documented, for many years, that the arrival procedures for Lakeland-Linder Airport (whilst engaging in the confusing and often dangerous maelstrom known as Sun 'n Fun) are at best confusing and often downright unworkable. Hundreds of pilots have complained about these procedures... some have even died while attempting to execute them. It floors us to see the City of Lakeland attempting to further victimize the pilot of an aircraft involved in an accident, a guy who lost his carefully crafted pride and joy (and nearly his life), and has definitely suffered for the folly of trying to visit one of the most poorly organized and executed aviation gatherings in the country (so say we and a GREAT number of others).

We asked EAA if they had ever heard of Oshkosh doing something like this to a pilot who had an accident at Wittman Field, and they could not recall any such thing... but then again, we expect the folks of Oshkosh to have a LOT more  class than the city fathers of Lakeland... who have shown a disturbing tendency (in our opinion)  to turn their back on hazards, dishonesty and anything that doesn't seem to feed their wallets or their egos.

If the situation at Sun 'n Fun wasn't bad enough, the greed, arrogance and insulting behavior shown by the City of Lakeland should suffice to keep many more people away from the ever-declining mess that Sun 'n Fun has become. Come hell or high water, they both seem to want your money... and if you have to crash your airplane, they still seem to want your money. I think it's time that we stop giving them our money and go elsewhere.

There is good news, though... in a few days, we're finally going to start talking about a project that may make this matter moot. It seems that a great many people are as sick of this mess as we are... and it seems that since Sun 'n Fun doesn't care to fix itself, that a replacement is very much in order. Wait til you hear what's about to happen...

MUCH more news to follow... -- Jim Campbell, ANN E-I-C

FMI: Read The NTSB Probable Cause Report