RV-7A down at KLAR...dated September 22, 2012

Donald Kundel, 79, a Duluth doctor, was killed while traveling to Laramie to visit his son.

FAA says the crash occurred under "known conditions."

He was the only one aboard.

According to the Laramie Wyoming Boomerang, the fire chief has a very odd description upon arriving at the scene.

“Our primary concern at that point was to stop the fire before it reached any of the structures,” the fire chief said. “With 15-20 mile per hour winds, they were driving the fire pretty quickly.”

Uh huh.

From the article, I believe the fire chief was referring to the grass fire that followed the accident.

RV-7A Down in Laramie...

RV-7A down in Laramie. A Minnesota native. Thoughts and prayers go out to his family and community.

http://www.northlandsnewscenter.com/news/local/Duluth-Pilot-Dies-in-Wyoming-Plane-Crash-170838051.html

I agree with Rob. I don't find anything unusual about the description. The chief was obviously concerned about the post crash fire.

The odd thing is ...

The spoken concern for the structures and the grass and the unspoken give up on attempting to save the person in the airplane. I'm sure those kinds of decisions are made by firemen and doctors all the time for a lot less reasons but it is odd to see it quoted in the public media that way.

Bob Axsom

As a member of the fire service for 18 years and having been a qualified airport rescue fire fighter, I can say we do have to make choices/determinations along those lines far more often than we care to.

The fire service and the media have a strained relation at times because of how they print what is said by chiefs and public information officers. In this case I am inclined to believe that the media censored the first part of the chief?s statement so that it would not be upsetting to the general public and or the family.

Sometimes those of us in the fire service are just to blunt for public consumption.

Welcome to VAF!!

Geoff, welcome to VAF.

I also am (was) a fireman, with CFR time. What you said is spot on.

rattler; said:

Sometimes those of us in the fire service are just to blunt for public consumption.

Click to expand...

Working on my 33rd year in CFR (Crash Fire Rescue) now called ARFF ( Aircraft Rescue Fire Fighting) sounds more positive I guess.

Firefighting is a lot like being a pilot. After an incident, there is all the time in the world for people to decide on a what action should have been taken. At the time the firefighter or pilot only have a few seconds to come up with a solution.

We train for this all the time, but you can't consider every eventuality and inevitably something unforeseen happens on just about every call.

Frankly, I consider as NORMAL that firefighters will do their best. Like the military and police, they often put their lives at risk to save others.

I do not take the comment as negative.

Probable cause revealed

The NTSB has now released the probable cause. The pilot attempted to land with a 14 knot quartering tailwind with gusts to 24 knots.

He had several more appropriate runways to choose, the NTSB said.