Father, son killed in plane crash in Clark County

10:36 PM PDT on Friday, May 2, 2008

By kgw.com Staff

CAMAS, Wash. -- A well-known aviator and his son were killed Friday afternoon in a small-plane crash in Clark County.


Benjamin Runyan, Sr., age 66, and Benjamin Runyan Jr., age 32, died in the crash.

Runyan, Sr. took off from Green Mountain airfield, a private airfield owned by Runyan himself, at about 4:30 p.m. The F.A.A. says the plane was bound for Klamath Falls.

The plane, a Russian "Yak 52" built in 1980, was in the air for about 30 seconds before it crashed, hitting trees about 2,500 feet off the end of the airstrip runway. A skid path could be seen leading up to the plane's wreckage.

http://www.kgw.com/news-local/stories/kgw_050208_news_plane_crash_clark_county.c1309437.html

RobBurson wrote:Father, son killed in plane crash in Clark County

10:36 PM PDT on Friday, May 2, 2008

By kgw.com Staff

CAMAS, Wash. -- A well-known aviator and his son were killed Friday afternoon in a small-plane crash in Clark County.


Benjamin Runyan, Sr., age 66, and Benjamin Runyan Jr., age 32, died in the crash.

Runyan, Sr. took off from Green Mountain airfield, a private airfield owned by Runyan himself, at about 4:30 p.m. The F.A.A. says the plane was bound for Klamath Falls.

The plane, a Russian "Yak 52" built in 1980, was in the air for about 30 seconds before it crashed, hitting trees about 2,500 feet off the end of the airstrip runway. A skid path could be seen leading up to the plane's wreckage.

http://www.kgw.com/news-local/stories/kgw_050208_news_plane_crash_clark_county.c1309437.html

Cr@p! That is bad news. I only met Ben a couple times. He seemed like a pretty descent guy.

My plane is at Green Mountain.

Looks like he departed 7 and was in the crosswind turn.

Stopped in at Pearson today (VUO). Ended up chatting with a couple people who had a few more details. Sounds like they made a low, high speed pass over the runway and came around again (which I've seen one of the pilots do on more than one occasion). Apparently, whoever was flying tried to do a barrel roll after the pass and didn't make it.

I had also talked previously to one of my partners in the 150. The Sunday prior he was refueling at Camas when one of the "Ben's" zipped over low then followed by a barrel roll.

Sounds like "Hot dogging" was the primary contributor to the accident.