Crashed plane may remain on Tallgrass golf course for weeks

It may be weeks before the single-engine airplane that crashed onto the Tallgrass Country Club golf course Friday afternoon is removed, the plane’s owner said Monday.

The two teens aboard the plane – the 17-year-old pilot and his 18-year-old passenger – escaped serious injury when the 1966 Mooney lost power shortly before his scheduled landing at Jabara Airport, said David Dewhirst, the owner of the plane.

The pilot set the plane down on the golf course next to 21st and Webb Road shortly before 3:30 p.m. Friday, authorities have said. The plane came to a rest on the fairway of the 14th hole near the green.

The pilot and passenger were taken to Wesley Medical Center for treatment, though Dewhirst said both were released Saturday.

“The engine failed for as-yet unknown reasons,” Dewhirst said Monday.

The FAA has completed its investigation at the crash site, he said. Now comes the business of getting the plane off the golf course.

“We have a slightly wrinkled Mooney for sale,” Dewhirst said, jokingly.

In truth, the plane is totaled. Normally, he said, they would simply bring a crane to the crash site to pick up the plane and load it onto a flatbed trailer for a semi to haul away.

“We can’t do that” in this case “because there’s no way we can get a crane in there,” Dewhirst said.

Houses surround the course so snugly that there’s no more than 15 to 20 feet between them, he said. It would cost more to bring a heavy helicopter to the crash site to carry the plane away, so he’s looking at having the plane dismantled piece-by-piece.

That could take a month, he said.

“The pieces have to be small enough and light enough … to carry the pieces out of there one at a time,” probably on a canvas stretcher about 12 feet long, Dewhirst said.

Tallgrass general manager Katie Schwartz said the course’s back nine holes were closed over the weekend and the entire course was closed Monday.

“We’ll figure it out going forward,” Schwartz said. “We’re in a waiting game right now.”

Evidence on the course indicates the plane bounced on the course three times before coming to a rest, Dewhirst said. Given the circumstances, he said, the damage on the course is relatively minor.

Schwartz concurred, saying, “It doesn’t appear to be a lot” of damage.

“But until we get out there to really get a look at it, we really don’t know,” she said. “All things considered, for a plane crashing out of the sky, it’s not too bad.”

This story was originally published March 21, 2016 at 1:49 PM with the headline "Crashed plane may remain on Tallgrass golf course for weeks."