Two injured in plane crash in Jean

Karen Zekan

Tuesday, June 17, 1997 | 11:59 a.m.

JEAN -- Federal aviation officials were searching for clues today to explain why a small Cessna 150 nosedived into the desert about 3,000 feet short of the Jean Airport runway, injuring two people.

Authorities also are hoping to interview the pilot and his female passenger, who were transported by Mercy Ambulance from the Sport Aviation Center to University Medical Center about 35 miles away with multiple facial cuts and leg injuries.

An off-duty California Highway Patrol officer who had been flying out of the same airport had landed and was taking a break about 4:50 p.m. Monday when he saw the mustard yellow and white craft fall from a few hundred feet above ground near a fenced lot housing various drums, rusted pipes and a silver catamaran.

"The (officer) said the aircraft appeared to be making a landing, and after a couple of attempts turned back toward the airport when it hit the ground," said Lt. Dwight Mahan, assigned to Metro Police's air support division.

"They had made a touch-down (landing) and had gone back in the air, heading south. They were in a turn, coming in for a landing, when it happened."

The CHP officer was the first to reach the conscious couple and called for emergency assistance.

The pilot was lifted from the plane's front seat through a side door, but Clark County firefighters were called in to extricate his female passenger pinned in a back seat.

The victims, whom Mahan identified only as an older couple, were listed in fair condition this morning at UMC.

The back end of the Cessna remained suspended at an angle in the air after the crash with its nose crunched in the dirt, propeller bent and pieces possibly belonging to its slightly mangled white wings scattered in the brush nearby.

The biggest concern with the crash, Mahan said, was that the passengers could have been crushed. The fuel tanks located in the wings did not appear to be disturbed.

Authorities declined to speculate on possible causes. The plane is based locally and is one of the more common models used for basic flight instruction.

The National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration are investigating the crash, which occurred about one mile from the center of the small airport. Authorities could not confirm Monday whether either of the passengers held a valid pilot's license or who owns the craft.

The Jean sport flying airstrip operates without an air traffic control tower, relying instead on communication between the pilots using it to accomplish safe takeoffs and landings.

McCarran International Airport frequencies do reach the remote site, but it was unknown if the Cessna's pilot had alerted anyone via radio to possible mechanical problems with the plane.

Mahan declined to comment on any radio communications the pilot may have had with other pilots within range of the Jean airport, saying only that the information they have will be turned over to the NTSB.