NTSB Identification: CEN15LA321
14 CFR Part 91: General Aviation
Accident occurred Monday, July 27, 2015 in Holland, MN
Aircraft: CHRISTENSEN STEVE WHEELER EXPRESS, registration: N3FC
Injuries: 3 Fatal.
This is preliminary information, subject to change, and may contain errors. Any errors in this report will be corrected when the final report has been completed. NTSB investigators may not have traveled in support of this investigation and used data provided by various sources to prepare this aircraft accident report.
On July 27, 2015, about 2013 central daylight time, a Steve Christensen Wheeler Express airplane, N3FC, was substantially damaged after impacting terrain near Holland, Minnesota. The pilot and two passengers were fatally injured. The airplane was registered to and operated by a private individual under the provisions of 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91 as a personal flight. Day visual meteorological conditions prevailed for the flight, with no flight plan filed. The local flight departed from Pipestone Municipal Airport (PQN), Pipestone, Minnesota about 1900.
A witness located near the accident site heard the engine sputter and restart on two occasions, followed by a loud bang. The airplane impacted into a grassy drainage ditch adjacent to a corn field, damaging the fuselage and both wings.
At 2014, the weather observation station at PQN, located about 7 miles southwest of the accident site, reported the following conditions: wind 150 degrees at 5 knots, 10 miles visibility, clear skies, temperature 27 degrees C, dew point 22 degree C, altimeter setting 29.83 inches of mercury.
FAA Flight Standards District Office: FAA Minneapolis FSDO-15
Any witnesses should email witness@ntsb.gov, and any friends and family who want to contact investigators about the accident should email assistance@ntsb.gov .
Fifty-nine-year-old Steven Christiansen was giving the teens a ride in his homebuilt plane on Monday night when it crashed into a cornfield near Holland in Pipestone County and killed all three.
Christiansen's longtime friend, 82-year-old Grant Volsch, says the teens were related to Christensen's daughter-in-law, Brisa. Volsch says Seth and Brisa Christiansen recently had a baby, so Brisa's 18-year-old brother, Marcos Favela, of Torrean, Mexico, and a 13-year-old female relative from Guadalajara, Mexico had been visiting.
Volsch says Christensen helped build the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Sioux Falls, South Dakota about 15 years ago.
Steven Christensen
PIPESTONE, Minn. — A 59-year-old southwest Minnesota farmer and two young passengers died in a plane crash on a calm, clear Monday night in Pipestone County.
According to information released late Tuesday morning by the Pipestone County Sheriff's Office, found dead at the scene were the pilot, Steven Christensen, of rural Pipestone, and two passengers, Marcos Favela, 18, of Torreon in north-central Mexico, and a 13-year-old female from Guadalajara, Mexico.
Christensen was flying a Wheeler Express that he built himself from a kit and had been flying for at least the past six years, according to Pipestone Municipal Airport Manager Rob Dykstra.
The airport manager told the Pipestone County Star that Christensen was an experienced pilot and rented a hangar at the airport.
Home-built airplanes are considered an experimental plane, he said, because it’s not built in a factory.
However, he said “experimentals are safe -- very safe.”
“He was a very capable pilot,” Dykstra told the newspaper. “What happened, I just don’t have a clue.”
When Dykstra left the airport around 5:10 p.m. on Monday night Christensen’s plane was still there. The airport does not have a log of scheduled flights, so he said he doesn’t know what time Christensen took off.
However, about 8 p.m., Travis Jasper said he and his construction crew were just finishing work for the day near the crash site when he heard what sounded like a plane in trouble.
"(I) heard it spitting and sputtering. It fired up a couple times and then I thought I heard a car door slam." Jasper told KSFY-TV in Sioux Falls, S.D. "A couple minutes later, I seen the neighbor at the corner and he's like, ‘I think a plane just went down,’ and I said ‘yeah, I think the same thing.’"
Jasper said he and his crew jumped on top of their vehicle to try to spot the plane in the cornfield.
Holland Fire Chief Chris Lingen said he was in Holland and didn't see or hear the plane go down.
A pilot from the Pipestone airport quickly helped with the search of the cornfield and spotted the plane for the emergency responders after receiving the initial 911 call, said Lingen.
The site of the crash about a half mile south of Holland in the cornfield was about a quarter mile from a road.
Lingen said they remained on scene until about midnight lighting it up for the coroner and investigators.
Source: http://www.duluthnewstribune.com
KSFY News caught up with Travis Jasper who owns Travis Jasper construction and has a shop located about a half mile from where a plane went down in Pipestone County on Monday night.
Steven Christensen, the pilot who died in the plane that crashed south of Holland Monday evening, July 27, was an experienced pilot who rented a hangar at Pipestone Municipal Airport.
Veteran pilot and Pipestone Municipal Airport Manager Rob Dykstra said Christensen was a farmer who lived north of Pipestone who had rented a hangar at the airport since at least 2004.
Dykstra said Christensen flew a home-built Wheeler Express that he built himself and had been flying for at least the past six years. Home-builts are considered an ‘experimental’ plane, Dysktra said, because it’s not built in a factory, but he said, “experimentals are safe –– very safe.
“He was a very capable pilot,” Dykstra said. “What happened, I just don’t have a clue.”
When Dykstra left the airport around 5:10 p.m. on Monday, July 27, Christensen’s plane was still there. The airport does not have a log of scheduled flights, so he said he doesn’t know what time Christensen took off.
“The planes come and go as they please,” Dykstra said.
For the complete story, see this week’s issue of the Pipestone County Star.
Two teenagers from Mexico were among the seven people killed when two small planes crashed separately within hours of one another in western Wisconsin and southwestern Minnesota, authorities said Tuesday.
A fixed-wing plane carrying three people crashed in a cornfield in southwestern Minnesota on Monday night, according to the Pipestone County Sheriff's Department. The pilot, Steven Christensen, 59, of rural Pipestone, and passengers Marcos Favela, 18, of Torreon, Mexico and an unidentified girl, 13, of Guadalajara, Mexico, died when the aircraft went down near Pipestone about 8 p.m., sheriff's officials said.
Travis Jasper said he and his construction crew were finishing work for the day near the crash site when he heard what sounded like a plane in trouble.
"(I) heard it spitting and sputtering. It fired up a couple times and then I thought I heard a car door slam." Jasper told KSFY-TV. "A couple minutes later I seen the neighbor at the corner and he's like, I think a plane just went down, and I said yah, I think the same thing."
Jasper said he and his crew jumped on top of their vehicle to try to spot the plane in the cornfield.
======
Three people died after a small plane went down in a cornfield in southwest Minnesota on Monday night.
Pipestone County sheriff’s officials said the small fixed-wing airplane went down in a corn field south of Holland, Minn. around 8:13 p.m., and first responders located it on a waterway in Grange Township Section 13, about 55 miles northeast of Sioux Falls, S.D. The occupants, a pilot and two passengers, were pronounced dead at the scene.
The pilot and passengers have been identified as:
Pilot: 59-year-old Steven Christensen of Pipestone
Marcos Favela, 18, of Torreon, Mexico
Unnamed 13-year-old girl of Guadalajara, Mexico
The Pipestone County Sheriff’s Office and Federal Aviation Administration are investigating the incident.
According to information released late Tuesday morning by the Pipestone County Sheriff's Office, found dead at the scene were the pilot, Steven Christensen, of rural Pipestone, and two passengers, Marcos Favela, 18, of Torreon in north-central Mexico, and a 13-year-old female from Guadalajara, Mexico.
Christensen was flying a Wheeler Express that he built himself from a kit and had been flying for at least the past six years, according to Pipestone Municipal Airport Manager Rob Dykstra.
The airport manager told the Pipestone County Star that Christensen was an experienced pilot and rented a hangar at the airport.
Home-built airplanes are considered an experimental plane, he said, because it’s not built in a factory.
However, he said “experimentals are safe -- very safe.”
“He was a very capable pilot,” Dykstra told the newspaper. “What happened, I just don’t have a clue.”
When Dykstra left the airport around 5:10 p.m. on Monday night Christensen’s plane was still there. The airport does not have a log of scheduled flights, so he said he doesn’t know what time Christensen took off.
However, about 8 p.m., Travis Jasper said he and his construction crew were just finishing work for the day near the crash site when he heard what sounded like a plane in trouble.
"(I) heard it spitting and sputtering. It fired up a couple times and then I thought I heard a car door slam." Jasper told KSFY-TV in Sioux Falls, S.D. "A couple minutes later, I seen the neighbor at the corner and he's like, ‘I think a plane just went down,’ and I said ‘yeah, I think the same thing.’"
Jasper said he and his crew jumped on top of their vehicle to try to spot the plane in the cornfield.
Holland Fire Chief Chris Lingen said he was in Holland and didn't see or hear the plane go down.
A pilot from the Pipestone airport quickly helped with the search of the cornfield and spotted the plane for the emergency responders after receiving the initial 911 call, said Lingen.
The site of the crash about a half mile south of Holland in the cornfield was about a quarter mile from a road.
Lingen said they remained on scene until about midnight lighting it up for the coroner and investigators.
Source: http://www.duluthnewstribune.com
KSFY News caught up with Travis Jasper who owns Travis Jasper construction and has a shop located about a half mile from where a plane went down in Pipestone County on Monday night.
Steven Christensen, the pilot who died in the plane that crashed south of Holland Monday evening, July 27, was an experienced pilot who rented a hangar at Pipestone Municipal Airport.
Veteran pilot and Pipestone Municipal Airport Manager Rob Dykstra said Christensen was a farmer who lived north of Pipestone who had rented a hangar at the airport since at least 2004.
Dykstra said Christensen flew a home-built Wheeler Express that he built himself and had been flying for at least the past six years. Home-builts are considered an ‘experimental’ plane, Dysktra said, because it’s not built in a factory, but he said, “experimentals are safe –– very safe.
“He was a very capable pilot,” Dykstra said. “What happened, I just don’t have a clue.”
When Dykstra left the airport around 5:10 p.m. on Monday, July 27, Christensen’s plane was still there. The airport does not have a log of scheduled flights, so he said he doesn’t know what time Christensen took off.
“The planes come and go as they please,” Dykstra said.
For the complete story, see this week’s issue of the Pipestone County Star.
Two teenagers from Mexico were among the seven people killed when two small planes crashed separately within hours of one another in western Wisconsin and southwestern Minnesota, authorities said Tuesday.
A fixed-wing plane carrying three people crashed in a cornfield in southwestern Minnesota on Monday night, according to the Pipestone County Sheriff's Department. The pilot, Steven Christensen, 59, of rural Pipestone, and passengers Marcos Favela, 18, of Torreon, Mexico and an unidentified girl, 13, of Guadalajara, Mexico, died when the aircraft went down near Pipestone about 8 p.m., sheriff's officials said.
Travis Jasper said he and his construction crew were finishing work for the day near the crash site when he heard what sounded like a plane in trouble.
"(I) heard it spitting and sputtering. It fired up a couple times and then I thought I heard a car door slam." Jasper told KSFY-TV. "A couple minutes later I seen the neighbor at the corner and he's like, I think a plane just went down, and I said yah, I think the same thing."
Jasper said he and his crew jumped on top of their vehicle to try to spot the plane in the cornfield.
======
Three people died after a small plane went down in a cornfield in southwest Minnesota on Monday night.
Pipestone County sheriff’s officials said the small fixed-wing airplane went down in a corn field south of Holland, Minn. around 8:13 p.m., and first responders located it on a waterway in Grange Township Section 13, about 55 miles northeast of Sioux Falls, S.D. The occupants, a pilot and two passengers, were pronounced dead at the scene.
The pilot and passengers have been identified as:
Pilot: 59-year-old Steven Christensen of Pipestone
Marcos Favela, 18, of Torreon, Mexico
Unnamed 13-year-old girl of Guadalajara, Mexico
The Pipestone County Sheriff’s Office and Federal Aviation Administration are investigating the incident.
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