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Highlands Today

Report Released For Fatal Airport Crash

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By BRAD DICKERSON

Highlands Today

Published: March 6, 2009

SEBRING - A fellow pilot who was trailing a Remos GX special light sport aircraft said the plane started rolling to the right when it was 25 to 50 feet above ground level.

This was just one of the observations found in the preliminary report filed by National Transportation Safety Board investigator Todd Gunther into the fatal Jan. 25 crash of the Remos aircraft at Sebring Regional Airport prior to the start of the U.S. Sport Aviation Expo.

The crash happened at 7:45 a.m. and killed passenger Steven Fletcher, a British photographer. The pilot, Mike Kostelac, of Virginia, was seriously injured in the accident.
Federal Aviation Administration records state that Kostelac held a commercial pilot certificate with ratings for single-engine and instrument airplanes.

The Remos was manufactured in 2008 and its most recent conditional inspection was finished on Jan. 8, 2009. By then, the plane had acquired 15 total hours of operation.

The plane experienced a loss of control during the "initial climb" just prior to the accident, Gunther wrote in his report.

"Visual meteorological conditions prevailed and no flight plan was filed for the local aerial photography flight," the report stated.

The second pilot, whose name was not included in the report, said the purpose of the flight was to take aerial photos of the manufacturer's airplanes for an article in an aviation magazine.

Expo chairman Robert Wood previously said Fletcher's photo shoot had nothing to do with the event.

After takeoff, the pilot also noticed that the Remos' rudder seemed to be deflected to the left, the airplane was slipping to the right and the left and right ailerons appeared to be "trailing edge down."

Ailerons are the movable flaps on an airplane's wings that control its rolling and banking movements.

The plane climbed to an altitude of 100 feet before starting to descend and continuing to turn to the right, Gunther wrote in his report. It eventually did a 270-degree turn and reached a bank angle of about 80 degrees. The right wing struck the ground first, followed by the nose of the aircraft.

The impact tore the right wing from the fuselage, which sustained damage itself.

Weather did not appear to play a part in the accident. The sky conditions for 7:45 a.m. on Jan. 25 were clear and the winds were calm, according to the report.

Highlands Today reporter Brad Dickerson can be reached at 863-386-5838 or bdickerson@highlandstoday.com

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