Four hurt in crash at Carson City airport

Monday, June 5, 2000 | 12:53 p.m.

The blue and white Mooney 201 broke apart after it stalled and smashed into a sagebrush-covered hill a few hundred yards west of the airport.

The pilot, William Hobbs of Folsom, Calif., and another man on board, Dr. Damon Stutes of Reno, were flown to Washoe Medical Center in Reno and admitted in critical condition. They were upgraded to serious Monday.

Two women on board, Catherine Armstrong and Kathleen Evans, both of Folsom, were hospitalized in satisfactory condition.

Jerry Polson and Louie Cuevano of Rancho Marrietta, Calif., told the Nevada Appeal the aircraft crashed on its second attempt to take off. Their's was the next aircraft in line on the runway.

"The first time I watched him, he was struggling halfway down the runway so he shut it off and pulled around behind us," said Polson, a veteran pilot with more than 1,000 hours air time.

He said the plane's motor sounded rough and the pilot revved the motor to clear it and then pulled back onto the runway for another attempt to take off.

"And you can see this thing is struggling; he's not making any speed," said Polson. "So he horsed it into the air and he got about 5 feet. It kind of went up and then the airplane just quit flying. You could see the right wing go up and he stalled it. The left wing hit first and it cartwheeled."

The engine landed 10 feet from the fuselage and the nose of the craft disintegrated leaving a tangle of metal and wiring where the instrument panel was and the cockpit ripped open. The fuselage snapped in half behind the passenger compartment, leaving the tail at a right-angle to the rest of the plane. One wing was broken and the other badly bent.

The Federal Aviation Administration was to arrive Monday to join Carson City sheriff's deputies in an investigation.