Jim,
I'm not a member of that Yahoo group, could you post the comments on here?
Thanks.
Ted is recovering. His comment to the ambulance crew was that he felt like
walking home...their response was that if he were 25 years old, they'd let
him. He was taken to the hospital as a precaution. It turns out that was
prudent. He suffered a couple of cracked vertebrae in his lower back.
Sounds like he'll be in for a few days.
I was on the taxiway watching when it happened. He had just made a touch
and go and was climbing out normally. Just about the time he turned
crosswind, I heard the engine quit. He made a play back toward the
runway...basically continuing his left turn. It appeared that energy bleed
in the turn was such that he wasn't going to make the field. He then picked
basically the only spot available and put in down on a golf driving range.
N36 51.272 W119 53.009 or
http://maps.google.com/maps?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rls=GGLR,GGLR:2006-01,GG\
LR:en&q=N36%2051.272%20W119%2053.009&um=1&sa=N&tab=wl
It is certainly sobering to watch a pal go in. The reality of how steep the
glide path is will open your eyes when you see it from outside for the first
time. I am impressed with Ted's handling of the situation. He did a good
job. If not for a small berm just past his touchdown spot, I think he would
have pulled the landing off without damage or injury. Unfortunately, there
was a bump that tossed him back up and on the second touchdown, the gear
folded back. The aircraft slid to a stop about 75 feet from initial
touchdown.
We had a bunch of the skypark neighbors there and recovered the airplane
less than three hours after touchdown.
Here is what the FAA has on the accident.
http://www.faa.gov/data_statistics/accident_incident/preliminary_data/media/M_1126_N.txt
The FAA Registry record is here:
http://registry.faa.gov/aircraftinquiry/NNumSQL.asp?NNumbertxt=6TR&cmndfind.x=24&cmndfind.y=7