Controllers Warned Pilot -- But Plane Crashed Into Mount Rainier Glacier; 5 Dead

Federal air-traffic controllers were trying to guide a plane full of rodeo cowboys away from Mount Rainier when the plane crashed, killing all five aboard.

The Federal Aviation Administration Air Route Traffic Control Center in Auburn, which oversees aircraft between airports throughout the Northwest, asked the plane's pilot to take evasive action about 1 p.m. yesterday, but moments later all radio and radar contact was lost, said FAA spokesman Mitch Barker.

``The airplane augered into the Kautz Glacier at the 12,500-foot level'' of the 14,411-foot mountain, said Rick Kirschner, a Rainier National Park ranger who participated in rescue efforts.

The single-engine Cessna 210 was en route from Pendleton, Ore., to Penticton, B.C., by way of Portland, said park spokesman Bill Dengler.

National Park Service officials said five people were supposed to be aboard the plane, but their

identities haven't been confirmed: pilot Bob Card of Pendleton, Ore.; Dave Smith of College Place, Walla Walla County; Mike Curran of Hermiston, Ore.; Randy Dierlam of Seadrift, Texas; and David Bowen of Yoakum, Texas.

``Air-traffic controllers saw the plane was headed for the mountain and contacted the pilot,'' Barker of the FAA said today. ``He was on visual flight rules,'' meaning supposedly the pilot was flying by sight and the aircraft was clear of clouds. ``They had asked him if he had the mountain in sight and he said no . . . that he was going to pass by it . . . go around it.''

But radar showed the plane continuing toward the mountain.

``He was quite near the mountain and they were trying to get his acknowledgement for directions away from the mountain.

``Eventually, they did get some acknowledgement, but right after that the aircraft disappeared from radar,'' Barker said.

Barker said the pilot obtained weather information from the FAA's Walla Walla Flight Service Station yesterday, but only for his flight from Pendleton to Portland.

``He might have gotten weather information from a private vendor from Portland to Penticton,'' said Barker, ``but he didn't get it from us.''

Keith Hyland, administrator for Canadian Professional Rodeo Association, said the four cowboys were headed to Canada to compete in the finals of the Ponoka Stampede in Alberta, the last of a series of small rodeos leading up to this weekend's Calgary Stampede. Ponoka is about 100 miles north of Calgary.

Smith, 31, the Washington state resident, was a veteran calf-roper who had been on the rodeo circuit for more than a decade, said Hyland. ``He was just a super guy, a nice quiet guy, a family guy,'' he said.

The men had qualified for the rodeo's finals during preliminary competition in Ponoka last weekend, then flew south to compete in other rodeos or see their families before returning, Hyland said.

A signal from the plane's locator beacon helped a search plane from the Air Force Reserve's rescue squadron from Portland to find the plane about 5:30 p.m. yesterday, Dengler said.

Fighting drizzle and low clouds at the base of the mountain and strong winds at higher elevations, a rescue team reached the crash site about 9 p.m.

The rescue team, ferried to the site on the south-southwest side of the mountain in an Army Chinook helicopter from Fort Lewis, spent the night preparing the bodies to be airlifted off the mountain today, Kirschner said.

Kirschner said reports from climbers early yesterday indicated the weather was clear above 11,000 feet.

``It crashed right in the middle of the mountain,'' Kirschner said. He said the tail end of the plane was broken and the wings were sheared off.

``You can't see the forward one-third of the plane,'' Kirschner said. ``It looks like it went straight in.''

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Previous crashes

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Previous crashes on Mount Rainier:

-- In January of this year, two Tacoma men were killed when their small plane crashed near the summit. The two-seat Piper 18 had taken off from Spanaway Airport south of Tacoma.

-- In March 1989, a Wenatchee man was killed when his Cessna 210 crashed while en route from Boeing Field to Wenatchee. The plane slammed nose-first into a 50-degree slope known as Willis Wall at the 12,600-foot level.

-- On March 21, 1983, five men were killed when a Navy twin-engine C-1A Trader crashed while en route from Yakima to McChord Air Force Base on a training flight.

-- In April 1968, two Air Force pilots died when their T-33 trainer, returning to Washington state from Mather Air Force Base, Calif., crashed just below Kautz Glacier.

-- On Dec. 10, 1946, 32 men were killed when a Marine Corps airplane crashed against the South Tahoma Glacier near Kautz Glacier.