Apparently the pilots were on simultaneous approaches at different altitudes, were communicating on different frequencies and landed on top of one another upon touchdown and rode piggyback down the airstrip. The relative speed between planes was so slow as to cause little damage. Oh yeah, the planes are both Beechcraft Bonanza planes. They did have to extract the pilot and passenger from the lower plane. Los Alamos has no airtraffic control or tower communication, so I guess planes that happen to be traveling above one another like this can't see, hear or communicate with each other.
The article in the local paper said this type of accident happens a few times per year in the US. Which seems astounding to me. I am not sure which way the planes come into land, but one end of the airstrip is essentially the end of the mesa and drops hundreds of feet , so landing to early or overshooting the end, could have been pretty sticky...
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Read about it here in the los alamos local fishwrap...
2 comments:
To quote Flo, "Must be matin' season at the airplane junkyard."
I agree with you it's a miracle
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